Quantum Field Theory
March 2, 2011 by Actaphysica
Filed under Mathematical Physics Book Reviews
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Classroom Tested, Student Approved,
I have been taught field theory from this text (actually, while it was in the process of being written), and then been a teaching assistant for the course in which it was used a second time.
In my experience, this is the best single text to use to learn field theory that one can buy today. It is completely modern in its presentation, and covers all of the fundamentals of field theory from scalars to spinors to gauge theory, and even has a significant amount of coverage of the standard model, specifically the Electro-weak theory. Additionally, the book is broken up into very short chapters of 4-10 pages each, and clearly cross referenced so you know what chapters are prerequisite knowledge.
There are a very large number of exercises which range in difficulty from very straightforward to very difficult. The problems manage to be educational and help deepen the understanding of what’s presented in the text while still being a challenge.
This is an extremely well-rounded text. It is easily readable, and provides good intuition about the theory, but also goes far more in depth then the other “easier-to-read” field theory texts out there. It also generally sticks to the most commonly used notation and in situations where new notation is needed, the ones that are used are clear and well thought out. A solid graduate quantum mechanics background is necessary to get the most out of this test, but much of the more advanced math is covered as the book needs it (or reviewed in the exercises).
One down side to being so thorough on the theoretical framework is the lack of any reference to experiment or historical development of field theory. If your goal is to learn field theory only from the experimental side, there are better books out there. But for a solid grounding in the fundamentals of field theory there is no better place to start then this.
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If only this book were available when I was in CalTech Phd program,
I was at Caltech 1984-86 in Phd. theoretical physics program and they were still using Bjorken & Drell and then Ramond for the final quarter – I fell behind when we hit chapter 8 renormalization never caught up and to my regret dropped out and became a professional high limit poker player. Every few years I would buy another QFT text – I tried them all (Peskin & Schroeder, Ryder, kaku, Weinberg, Itzykson & Zuber, Hatfield, Zee)- learn a little but still never felt confortable with the subject. Then I discovered Prof. Srednicki’s book on the internet and realized this is the book I have been waiting for. The subject is presented logically and coherently from a theorist point of view.
Renormalization, path integrals etc. are all treated from the beginning with a toy phi-cubed theory. What other field theory book actually shows you the double taylor expansion as in 9.11 page 60 and then clearly explains all the symmetry factors and numerical factors that lead to the final feynman diagrams.
The best part of the book is the problems – they are neither trivial nor research projects – so far I have worked almost every problem in part 1 (scalar fields)- and they are all instructive and doable. I particularly liked problem 10.5 on field redefinition – when you solve this one you know you understand the material on feynman diagrams and scattering amplitudes.
The treatment of scalar fields followed by spinor fields and then gauge fields enables one to learn the subject and gain confidence without overwhelming you with all the technical details and indices at once.
The only other book that compares with this one are Weinberg’s which I would recommend tackling after Srednicki. I would also recommend Zee’s nutshell book for those like myself who read QFT books for fun.
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Very interesting as mathematical view about physics.,
The book talks about the applications of the group theory to the quantum physics. The methods used by auctor are in relation to the differential geometry and the matrix algebra. The instruments applied are traditional, as the Hilbert spaces and the Galois and Lie groups, but the auctor shows also important properties of modern physics.
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