Jean-Pierre Serre

This book reproduces J-P. Serre's 1964 Harvard lectures. The aim is to introduce the reader to the "Lie dictionary": Lie algebras and Lie groups. Special features of the presentation are its emphasis on formal groups (in the Lie group part) and the use of analytic manifolds on p-adic fields. Some knowledge of algebra and calculus is required of the reader, but the text is easily accessible to graduate students, and to mathematicians at large.

These notes, already well known in their original French edition, give the basic theory of semisimple Lie algebras over the complex numbers including the basic classification theorem. The author begins with a summary of the general properties of nilpotent, solvable, and semisimple Lie algebras. Subsequent chapters introduce Cartan subalgebras, root systems, and representation theory. The theory is illustrated by using the example of sln; in particular, the representation theory of sl2 is completely worked out. The last chapter discusses the connection between Lie algebras and Lie groups, and is intended to guide the reader towards further study.

This volume is being published in connection with a March, 1987 workshop on Galois groups over Q and related topics, held at the Mathematical Sciences Research Institute in Berkeley. The organizing committee for the workshop consisted of Kenneth Ribet (chairman), Yasutaka Ihara, and Jean-Pierre Serre. The volume contains key original papers by experts in the field, and treats a variety of questions in arithmetical algebraic geometry. A number of the contributions discuss Galois actions on fundamental groups, and associated topics: these include Fermat curves, Gauss sums, cyclotomic units, and motivic questions. Other themes which reoccur include semistable reduction of algebraic varieties, deformations of Galois representations, and connections between Galois representations and modular forms. The authors contributing to the volume are: G.W. Anderson, D. Blasius, D. Ramakrishnan, P. Deligne, Y. Ihara, U. Jannsen, B.H. Matzat, B. Maszur, and K. Wingberg. The contributions are of exceptionally high quality, and this book will have permanent value. The volume will be of great interest to students and established workers in many areas of algebraic number theory and algebraic geometry.

"This book presents several basic techniques in algebraic geometry, group representations, number theory, -adic and standard cohomology, and modular forms. It explores how NX(p) varies with p when the family (X) of polynomial equations is fixed. The text examines the size and congruence properties of NX(p) and describes the ways in which it is computed. Along with covering open problems and offering simple, illustrative examples, the author presents various theorems, including the Chebotarev density theorem and the prime number theorem"-- "The main topic involves counting solutions mod p of a system of polynomial equations, as p varies. The book is based on a series of lectures presented by the author in Taiwan. Using this idea, Serre visits algebra and number theory and asks some non-standard questions, especially on group representations"--