8.324 | Fall 2010 | Graduate

Relativistic Quantum Field Theory II

Readings

Three books will be used in this course. Other recommended books are listed below.

Peskin, Michael E., and Daniel V. Schroeder. An Introduction to Quantum Field Theory. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1995. ISBN: 9780201503975.
A comprehensive and pedagogical treatment of QFT starting from the basics and reaching up to the physics of the standard model.

Weinberg, S. The Quantum Theory of Fields. Vol. 1: Foundations. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1995. ISBN: 9780521550017.
A comprehensive and insightful treatment of the foundations of QFT.

———. The Quantum Theory of Fields. Vol. 2: Modern Applications. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1996. ISBN: 9780521550024.
A detailed presentation of advanced material.

LEC # TOPICS READINGS
1-6 Non-Abelian gauge theories

Peskin and Schroeder chapter 15 and 16;

Weinberg vol. 2 chapter 15;

Prof. Zwiebach’s notes on Lie algebras (PDF) (Courtesy of Prof. Barton Zwiebach.)

7-11 General aspects

Peskin and Schroeder chapter 6 and 7;

Weinberg vol. 1 chapter 10

12-16 General aspects of QED

Peskin and Schroeder chapter 6 and 7;

Weinberg vol. 1 chapter 11

17-19 General renormalization theory

Peskin and Schroeder chapter 10;

Weinberg vol. 1 chapter 12

20-26 Renormalization group

Peskin and Schroeder chapter 12 and 13;

Weinberg vol 2 chapter 18

Recommended Books

Zee, A. Quantum Field Theory in a Nutshell. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2003. ISBN: 9780691010199.
A fun book that deals briefly with many of the key ideas and uses of QFT.

Srednicki, Mark. Quantum Field Theory. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2007. ISBN: 9780521864497.
Very readable and comprehensive. Structured somewhat differently from this course. Part I (spin 0) and Part II (spin 1/2) are available at http://arxiv.org/abs/hep-th/0409035 and http://arxiv.org/abs/hep-th/0409036.

Banks, Tom. Modern Quantum Field Theory: A Concise Introduction. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2008. ISBN: 9780521850827.
Modern, insightful treatment of many important topics.

Brown, Lowell S. Quantum Field Theory. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1994. ISBN: 9780521469463.
A modern path integral presentation of QFT. Covers QED but not QCD.

Collins, J. Renormalization. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1986. ISBN: 9780521311779.
A complete treatise on the methods of renormalization.

Ramond, P. Field Theory: A Modern Primer. 2nd ed. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1994. ISBN: 9780201546118.
A book dealing efficiently with QFT in the path integral approach.

Ryder, L. Quantum Field Theory. 2nd ed. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1986. ISBN: 9780521338592.
A modern pedagogical introduction to QFT including the Weinberg-Salam model and other selected topics.

Mandl, F., and G. Shaw. Quantum Field Theory. New York, NY: John Wiley & Sons, 1984. ISBN: 9780471105091.
A clear and concise introduction to the basic computations in quantum field theory.

Course Info

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Fall 2010
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Learning Resource Types
Problem Sets with Solutions
Lecture Notes