Nolting W. Fundamentals of Many-body Physics: Principles and Methods

Springer, 2009. — 606 p. — ISBN: 978-3-540-71930-4.The goal of the present course on “Fundamentals of Theoretical Physics” is to be a direct accompaniment to the lower-division study of physics, and it aims at providing the physical tools in the most straightforward and compact form as needed by the students in order to master theoretically more complex topics and problems in advanced studies and in research. The presentation is thus intentionally designed to be sufficiently detailed and self-contained – sometimes, admittedly, at the cost of a certain elegance – to permit individual study without reference to the secondary literature. This volume deals with the quantum theory of many-body systems. Building upon a basic knowledge of quantum mechanics and of statistical physics, modern techniques for the description of interacting many-particle systems are developed and applied to various real problems, mainly from the area of solid-state physics. A thorough revision should guarantee that the reader can access the relevant research literature without experiencing major problems in terms of the concepts and vocabulary, techniques and deductive methods found there.
The world which surrounds us consists of very many particles interacting with one another, and their description requires in principle the solution of a corresponding number of coupled quantum-mechanical equations of motion (Schrödinger equations),which, however, is possible only in exceptional cases in a mathematically strict sense. The concepts of elementary quantum mechanics and quantum statistics are therefore not directly applicable in the form in which we have thus far encountered them. They require an extension and restructuring, which is termed “many-body theory”.Second Quantisation
Many-Body Model Systems
Green’s Functions
Systems of Interacting Particles
Perturbation Theory (T = 0)
Perturbation Theory at Finite Temperatures
Solutions of the Exercises