Quantum Field Theory: Amazon.ca: Lewis H. Ryder: Books

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"It is very strongly recommended to anyone seeking an elementary introduction to modern approaches to quantum field theory." Physics Bulletin

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This book is a modern introduction to the ideas and techniques of quantum field theory. After a brief overview of particle physics and a survey of relativistic wave equations and Lagrangian methods, the author develops the quantum theory of scalar and spinor fields, and then of gauge fields. The emphasis throughout is on functional methods, which have played a large part in modern field theory. The book concludes with a brief survey of "topological" objects in field theory and, new to this edition, a chapter devoted to supersymmetry. Graduate students in particle physics and high energy physics will benefit from this book.

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First Sentence
Quantum field theory has traditionally been a pursuit of particle physicists. Read the first page

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Customer Reviews

16 Reviews

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4.4 out of 5 stars (16 customer reviews)

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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Very readable introduction to Quantum Field Theory, Aug 16 2011

By

Dr. Bojan Tunguz (Indiana, USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 50 REVIEWER) (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Quantum Field Theory (Paperback)

This textbook is probably one of the most readable books on Quantum Field Theory. The level of formalism and mathematical complexity varies from chapter to chapter, which has its virtues and drawbacks. The chapters that are not too math-heavy are usually the more intelligible ones, and they present the otherwise fairly arcane material in a very accessible and physically-motivated fashion. On the other hand these chapters leave out a lot of calculation or just skim through those somewhat superficially. If you are trying to learn Quantum Field Theory so that you become proficient enough to pursue research in this field, then you may find this lack of detail frustrating.

One of the virtues of this book are the extended references that can be found at the ends of chapters. These refer both to the original research papers and other books that may cover the same material in more depth or with a different approach. These references are invaluable in their own right, and make this book a great resource to have.

The last chapter focuses on supersymmetry. This could be viewed as a somewhat controversial choice of topic to be included in a textbook that covers the fundamentals of quantum field theory. Supersymmetry, despite decades of theoretical investigation, so far has not yielded a single observable verification. There might be something in the claims of its proponents that it has a very appealing conceptual and mathematical structure, but even its simplest formulation that have any bearing on the real world are so complex that any traces of conceptual simplicity are irrevocably lost. However, whatever your feelings about supersymmetry might be, this chapter is valuable in its own right, since it gives a lot of interesting mathematics that are relevant to fermionic and bosonic fields in general.

One big problem that I have with this book as a textbook is a total lack of problems and exercises. As such is probably not well suited as a primary book for learning this material. Nonetheless, there are some detailed calculations of some important formal results, and these can be used in conjunction with other textbooks.

I would recommend this book to be used as a secondary study material for an introductory course on Quantum Field Theory. This way all of its strong points would be utilized, while its few weaknesses would not be an obstacle to fully absorbing otherwise very difficult material.

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5.0 out of 5 stars An Inspiring Introduction to QFT, Sep 30 2002

By

Derek Lee (St. Paul, MN USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Quantum Field Theory (Paperback)

One of the basic questions in the education of theoretical physics is, what is a good way of introducing QFT and giving the student a taste of what is to come? In my opinion, this book offers a fine solution to this thorny problem.
There are many sides to this question; for example, there is the view that the students should be exposed to this vast topic in a complete and thorough way (for such a text, I HIGHLY recommend Weinberg's 3 volume set, which, if not commonly regarded as a classic yet, soon will be), and also there is the point of view that most of the students studying QFT are experimentalists, so they should first be exposed to how to calculate amplitudes and cross sections for useful processes as soon as possible (see Peskin-Schroder for an outstanding exemplification of this principle). Both of these points of view have strong arguments supporting them, and there are many other reasonable opinions that might be taken; perhaps this is an indication that there is not any one approach to this subject which is a good introduction for all, but rather that the student must choose intelligently which text he/she finds they are most comfortable with. However, I can say that for me at least, this book had just the right selection of topics and at just the right level to get me interested in the subject and to give me a taste as to what it would be like if I were to go into it in more depth (which indeed I did). Other reviewers are quite right in pointing out that there are several inaccuracies in this text; also in more than a few places the treatment is considerably less clear than it might have been (this is one of the main strengths of Weinberg's set; every last detail is crystal clear, and the physical reasoning in the derivations is very rarely muddled in the math). Perhaps in this sense, the book could have been better written, and just by this element of style, I probably would have rated this 4 stars. However, I think that these valid criticisms are more than offset by the overwhelming strength of the book:that it is truly inspiring. Several reviewers have gone over details; I shall not rehash these matters, but instead leave off with the statement that this book was the best introduction to QFT that I could have bought.

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5.0 out of 5 stars one of good books, Mar 8 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Quantum Field Theory (Paperback)

1)as other reviewers put, we cannot expect every thing from one source. but without doubt, this is a good buy.
2)this is not so pedagogic as the book seller's copy on the backcover. it needs some endeavor of course.
3)major flaw i noticed is only one: at page 150 the author mingled two different things i.e. (a)subsidiary condition which excludes unphysical state from consideration (b)re-definition of norm which brings the unphysical state into consideration.

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Most recent customer reviews

3.0 out of 5 stars Reminds me of Sakurai
This book reminds me of Sakurai's book Modern Quantum Mechanics, in that Sakurai manages to explain many topics in a very compact form, but is not always suitable
for... Read more

Published on Feb 15 2002 by Assaf Tal

4.0 out of 5 stars An excellent pedagogical suplement
You wouldn't want to rely on this as your only source for QFT, but it provides a really nice, easy to read, supplemental point of view to other more computation-oriented texts... Read more

Published on Aug 7 2001