Andrzej Borowiec - Böcker

This volume contains the lectures given at the Second Max Born Symposium held near Wroclaw in Poland in September 1992. The various authoritative contributions provide an review of recent developments in the field and embrace the following topics: spin structures; the interrelations between Cartan's and Chevalley's theory of spinors, Clifford algebras and particle models; the interrelations between twistors, supersymmetry and phase spaces; quantum deformations; noncommutative Hopf algebras; noncommutative calculus and its applications in electrodynamics and in gauge theory; and deformed Clifford algebras and Z3-graded algebras. For researchers and graduate students in mathematical and theoretical physics.

This collection of articles deals with many of the fundamental problems in quantum physics, addressing current topics of research in quantum field theory and supersymmetry in particular. It has been written by leading researchers in the field who emphasize the mathematical and conceptual aspects of the physical theories. Speculative topics at the very forefront of research have been included to illustrate the many open possibilities in contemporary theoretical and mathematical physics.

The XII Max Born Symposium has a special character. It was held in honour th of Jan Lopusza nski on the occasion of his 75 birthday. As a rule the Max Born Symposia organized by the Institute of Theoretical Physics at the University of Wroc law were devoted to well-de ned subjects of contemporary interest. This time, however, the organizers decided to make an exception. Lopusza nski’s in?uence on and contribution to the development of th- retical physics at Wrocla w University is highly appreciable. His personality and scienti c achievements gave him authority which he used to the best - vantage of the Institute. In fact we still pro t from his knowledge, experience and judgment. Lopusza nski’s scienti c activity extended over about half a century. He successfully participated in research on the most important and fascinating issues of theoretical physics. During his scienti c career he met and made friends with many outstanding physicists who shaped theoretical physics to the present form. For this reason, as well as the coincidence of the approaching end of the century, we thought that it would be interesting and instructive to give the symposium a retrospective character. We decided to trust the speakers’ judgment and intuition for the choice of subjects for their talks. We just asked them to give the audience the important message based on their knowledge and experience.