John Horton Conway's unique approach to quadratic forms was the subject of the Hedrick Lectures that he gave in August of 1991 at the Joint Meetings of the Mathematical Association of America and the American Mathematical Society in Orono, Maine. This book presents the substance of those lectures. The book should not be thought of as a serious textbook on the theory of quadratic forms. It consists rather of a number of essays on particular aspects of quadratic forms that have interested the author. The lectures are self-contained and will be accessible to the generally informed reader who has no particular background in quadratic form theory. The minor exceptions should not interrupt the flow of ideas. The afterthoughts to the lectures contain discussion of related matters that occasionally presuppose greater knowledge.

This volume outlines the proceedings of the conference on "Quadratic Forms and Their Applications" held at University College Dublin. It includes survey articles and research papers ranging from applications in topology and geometry to the algebraic theory of quadratic forms and its history. Various aspects of the use of quadratic forms in algebra, analysis, topology, geometry, and number theory are addressed. Special features include the first published proof of the Conway-Schneeberger Fifteen Theorem on integer-valued quadratic forms and the first English-language biography of Ernst Witt, founder of the theory of quadratic forms.

A gem of a book bringing together 30 years worth of results that are certain to interest anyone whose research touches on quadratic forms.

Prominent Russian mathematician's concise, well-written exposition considers n-dimensional spaces, linear and bilinear forms, linear transformations, canonical form of an arbitrary linear transformation, and an introduction to tensors. While not designed as an introductory text, the book's well-chosen topics, brevity of presentation, and the author's reputation will recommend it to all students, teachers, and mathematicians working in this sector.

Lectures on Number Theory is the first of its kind on the subject matter. It covers most of the topics that are standard in a modern first course on number theory, but also includes Dirichlet's famous results on class numbers and primes in arithmetic progressions.