MAT 4144/5158 (Winter 2010)

Introduction to Lie Groups

Syllabus

The syllabus will be updated as the course progresses. Unless otherwise indicated, section numbers and exercises refer to the text Naive Lie Theory by John Stillwell.

Date Text Sections Material Recommended Exercises
Jan 6 1.1 Introduction, a categorical definition of Lie groups, examples. 1.1.1–1.1.5
Jan 11 1.2, 1.3 Rotations of the plane, quaternions. 1.2.1–1.2.5; 1.3.1–1.3.8
Jan 13 No class. Make-up class to be held on January 21 at 11:30am.
Jan 18 1.4, 1.5 Quaternions and space rotations. 1.4.1–1.4.4; 1.5.1–1.5.4
Jan 20 2.3, 2.4 SU(2) and SO(3), The Cartan-Dieudonné Theorem. 2.1.3–2.1.6; 2.2.1–2.2.5; 2.3.1–2.3.5
Jan 21 2.5–2.7 Make-up class, LMX 242, 11:30am–1:00pm. Quaternions and rotations in R4, SU(2)xSU(2) and SO(4). 2.6.1–2.6.3; 2.7.1–2.7.5
Jan 25 3.1–3.4 Matrix Lie groups: definitions and examples. 3.3.1–3.3.6
Jan 27 3.4, 8.6 The symplectic groups, connectedness. 3.2.1–3.2.3; 3.4.1–3.4.5
Feb 1 3.2–3.3 Connectedness.
Feb 3 8.1–8.4 Compactness. 8.2.1–8.2.3
Feb 8 3.5–3.6 Maximal tori. 3.5.2–3.5.6; 3.6.1–3.6.2
Feb 10 3.7–3.8 Centres and discrete subgroups. 3.7.1–3.7.3; 3.8.1–3.8.5
Feb 22 4.1–4.4 The exponential map, Lie algebras. 4.1.3–4.1.4; 4.2.1–4.2.3; 4.3.2–4.3.3
Feb 24 Midterm exam (covers up to and including the material covered before the reading break).
Mar 1 4.5, 5.1 The matrix exponential, tangent spaces. 4.5.1–4.5.6
Mar 3 5.2–5.5 Tangent spaces (cont.), the Lie algebra of a Lie group. 5.2.1–5.2.8; 5.3.6; 5.3.7; 5.4.1–5.4.5
Mar 8 5.6, 7.1 Complexification, the matrix logarithm. 5.6.1; 5.6.4–5.6.8; 7.1.6
Mar 10 7.1–7.3 The matrix logarithm, the exponential map. 7.2.1; 7.2.4–7.2.6; 7.3.1; 7.3.2
Mar 15 7.4 The matrix logarithm, the exponential map (cont.). 7.4.1; 7.4.2
Mar 17 Hall 2.4, 2.6 One parameter subgroups, the functor from Lie groups to Lie algebras. 7.4.1; 7.4.2
Mar 22 Stillwell 7.5 and Hall 2.6, 2.7 The adjoint mapping, normal subgroups and Lie algebras. 7.5.2–7.5.4.
Mar 24 7.6 The Campbell-Baker-Hausdorff Theorem. 7.6.1–7.6.4 (note that 7.6.3 and 7.6.4 only apply in a neighbourhood of the identity); 7.7.1–7.7.2
Mar 29 8.7 Teaching evaluations. Simple connectedness. 8.7.1–8.7.5
Mar 31 9.1, 9.2 Simple connectedness, simply connected Lie groups. 9.1.3; 9.1.4
Apr 7 9.4–9.6 Simply connected Lie groups and their characterization by Lie algebras.
Apr 12 Hall 3.7 Covering groups.

Notes

Below are lecture notes for the course. They are a single file that will be updated after each lecture. Please keep in mind that these are notes that I write for myself when preparing the lecture and should be complemented by a student's own class notes. I will often say more in class than is in the notes.