Proceedings of the Summer Advanced Study Institute held at Graz, Austria, August 4-15, 1975

Self-contained treatment of nonrelativistic many-particle systems discusses both formalism and applications in terms of ground-state (zero-temperature) formalism, finite-temperature formalism, canonical transformations, and applications to physical systems. 1971 edition.

Nuclear double beta decay is - together with proton decay - one of the most promising tools for probing beyond-the-standard-model physics on beyond-accelerator energy scales. It is already probing the TeV scale, on which new physics should manifest itself according to theoretical expectations. Only in the early 1980s was it known that double beta decay yields information on the Majorana mass of the exchanged neutrino. At present, the sharpest bound for the electron neutrino arises from this process. It is only in the last 10 years that the much more far-reaching potential of double beta decay has been discovered. Today, the potential of double beta decay includes a broad range of topics that are equally relevant to particle physics & astrophysics, such as masses of heavy neutrinos, the sneutrino, SUSY models, compositeness, leptoquarks & right-handed W bosons. This invaluable book outlines the development of double beta research from its beginnings until its most recent achievements, & also presents the outlook for its highly exciting future. Readership: Particle physicists, nuclear physicists & astrophysicists.