Description
Nobel Laureate Steven Weinberg combines his exceptional physical insight with his gift for clear exposition to provide a concise introduction to modern quantum mechanics. Ideally suited to a one-year graduate course, this textbook is also a useful reference for researchers. Readers are introduced to the subject through a review of the history of quantum mechanics and an account of classic solutions of the Schrödinger equation, before quantum mechanics is developed in a modern Hilbert space approach. The textbook covers many topics not often found in other books on the subject, including alternatives to the Copenhagen interpretation, Bloch waves and band structure, the Wigner–Eckart theorem, magic numbers, isospin symmetry, the Dirac theory of constrained canonical systems, general scattering theory, the optical theorem, the ‘in-in’ formalism, the Berry phase, Landau levels, entanglement and quantum computing.
In order to fully appreciate the content of Weinberg’s book, one needs to study Paul Dirac’s Quantum Mechanics or Albert Messiah’s Quantum Mechanics before hand. Beginners will have difficulty appreciating the physics behind the mathematical rigor (ie. abstractness). Weinberg took the same approach as Dirac in discussing the complexity of quantum mechanics. However Weinberg discussed additional topics not found in standard quantum mechanics books; such as different interpretation of the quantum world, Open systems using density matrix, quantum measurements, quantum entanglement, Berry phase, Rabi oscillations, Feynman’s path integral formulation, gauge invariance, quantum computation. I gained a better understanding of quantum physics from Weinberg’s exposition during the course of my research on the foundation of quantum mechanics.
While there are a multitude of QM textbooks available for students and experts, Steven Weinberg’s book
is still a great addition to the existing QM books.
Excellent text for new students and experienced physicists. Weinberg’s insight into the essential physics of quantum mechanics is unmatched by other texts with similar titles.
I am starting the second semester undergrad QM class, and this text fills in a lot of the questions I had on problems we encountered in the first class. For a grad class it would be just right to help fill in some of the background needed and math derivations for equations and problem solutions in the class. clearly written, but it assumes a strong background to understand.
The hard bound book is a pleasure to read. Weinberg is an acknowledged master, so there is always something new that one learns from him, even though there are so many other good texts on quantum mechanics. His introductory history chapter is very instructive, like a similar chapter in his QFT books. The treatment in the rest of the book again shows the characteristic thoroughness of his writings.
I only wished he had used Dirac notation for convenience of students,though by not using it, he has removed the widely prevalent misconception that Dirac notation is a must for abstract formulation of QM.