Spin connectionIn differential geometry and mathematical physics, a spin connection is a connection on a spinor bundle. It is induced, in a canonical manner, from the affine connection. It can also be regarded as the gauge field generated by local Lorentz transformations. In some canonical formulations of general relativity, a spin connection is defined on spatial slices and can also be regarded as the gauge field generated by local rotations.
Glossary of Riemannian and metric geometryThis is a glossary of some terms used in Riemannian geometry and metric geometry — it doesn't cover the terminology of differential topology. The following articles may also be useful; they either contain specialised vocabulary or provide more detailed expositions of the definitions given below. Connection Curvature Metric space Riemannian manifold See also: Glossary of general topology Glossary of differential geometry and topology List of differential geometry topics Unless stated otherwise, letters X, Y, Z below denote metric spaces, M, N denote Riemannian manifolds, |xy| or denotes the distance between points x and y in X.
Curvature of Riemannian manifoldsIn mathematics, specifically differential geometry, the infinitesimal geometry of Riemannian manifolds with dimension greater than 2 is too complicated to be described by a single number at a given point. Riemann introduced an abstract and rigorous way to define curvature for these manifolds, now known as the Riemann curvature tensor. Similar notions have found applications everywhere in differential geometry of surfaces and other objects. The curvature of a pseudo-Riemannian manifold can be expressed in the same way with only slight modifications.
Meagre setIn the mathematical field of general topology, a meagre set (also called a meager set or a set of first category) is a subset of a topological space that is small or negligible in a precise sense detailed below. A set that is not meagre is called nonmeagre, or of the second category. See below for definitions of other related terms. The meagre subsets of a fixed space form a σ-ideal of subsets; that is, any subset of a meagre set is meagre, and the union of countably many meagre sets is meagre.
Rigged Hilbert spaceIn mathematics, a rigged Hilbert space (Gelfand triple, nested Hilbert space, equipped Hilbert space) is a construction designed to link the distribution and square-integrable aspects of functional analysis. Such spaces were introduced to study spectral theory in the broad sense. They bring together the 'bound state' (eigenvector) and 'continuous spectrum', in one place. A function such as is an eigenfunction of the differential operator on the real line R, but isn't square-integrable for the usual Borel measure on R.
Symplectic geometrySymplectic geometry is a branch of differential geometry and differential topology that studies symplectic manifolds; that is, differentiable manifolds equipped with a closed, nondegenerate 2-form. Symplectic geometry has its origins in the Hamiltonian formulation of classical mechanics where the phase space of certain classical systems takes on the structure of a symplectic manifold. The term "symplectic", introduced by Weyl, is a calque of "complex"; previously, the "symplectic group" had been called the "line complex group".
Connection (vector bundle)In mathematics, and especially differential geometry and gauge theory, a connection on a fiber bundle is a device that defines a notion of parallel transport on the bundle; that is, a way to "connect" or identify fibers over nearby points. The most common case is that of a linear connection on a vector bundle, for which the notion of parallel transport must be linear. A linear connection is equivalently specified by a covariant derivative, an operator that differentiates sections of the bundle along tangent directions in the base manifold, in such a way that parallel sections have derivative zero.
Group (mathematics)In mathematics, a group is a non-empty set with an operation that satisfies the following constraints: the operation is associative, has an identity element, and every element of the set has an inverse element. Many mathematical structures are groups endowed with other properties. For example, the integers with the addition operation is an infinite group, which is generated by a single element called 1 (these properties characterize the integers in a unique way).
Dense setIn topology and related areas of mathematics, a subset A of a topological space X is said to be dense in X if every point of X either belongs to A or else is arbitrarily "close" to a member of A — for instance, the rational numbers are a dense subset of the real numbers because every real number either is a rational number or has a rational number arbitrarily close to it (see Diophantine approximation). Formally, is dense in if the smallest closed subset of containing is itself.
Reflexive spaceIn the area of mathematics known as functional analysis, a reflexive space is a locally convex topological vector space (TVS) for which the canonical evaluation map from into its bidual (which is the strong dual of the strong dual of ) is an isomorphism of TVSs. Since a normable TVS is reflexive if and only if it is semi-reflexive, every normed space (and so in particular, every Banach space) is reflexive if and only if the canonical evaluation map from into its bidual is surjective; in this case the normed space is necessarily also a Banach space.
