Knots - Mathematics with a Twist

Alexei Sossinsky

146 pages, parution le 31/12/2002

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Résumé

This book, written by a mathematician known for his own work on knot theory, is a clear, concise, and engaging introduction to this complicated subject. A guide to the basic ideas and applications of knot theory, Knots takes us from Lord Kelvin's early--and mistaken--idea of using the knot to model the atom, almost a century and a half ago, to the central problem confronting knot theorists today: distinguishing among various knots, classifying them, and finding a straightforward and general way of determining whether two knots--treated as mathematical objects--are equal.

Communicating the excitement of recent ferment in the field, as well as the joys and frustrations of his own work, Alexei Sossinsky reveals how analogy, speculation, coincidence, mistakes, hard work, aesthetics, and intuition figure far more than plain logic or magical inspiration in the process of discovery. His spirited, timely, and lavishly illustrated work shows us the pleasure of mathematics for its own sake as well as the surprising usefulness of its connections to real-world problems in the sciences. It will instruct and delight the expert, the amateur, and the curious alike.

Contents

Atoms and Knots
Lord Kelvin -- 1860
Braided Knots
Alexander -- 1923
Planar Diagrams of Knots
Reidemeister -- 1928
The Arithmetic of Knots
Schubert -- 1949
Surgery and Invariants
Conway -- 1973
Jones's Polynomial and Spin Models
Kauffman -- 1987
Finite-Order Invariants
Vassiliev -- 1990
Knots and Physics
Xxx? -- 2004?

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	PAPIER
Éditeur(s)	Harvard Business School Press (HBS)
Auteur(s)	Alexei Sossinsky
Parution	31/12/2002
Nb. de pages	146
Format	14,5 x 19
Couverture	Relié
Poids	283g
Intérieur	Noir et Blanc
EAN13	9780674009448
ISBN13	978-0-674-00944-8