G. Velo - Böcker

One of the goals of mathematical physics is to provide a rigorous derivation of the properties of macroscopic matter starting from Schrodinger's equation. Although at the present time this objective is far from being realized, there has been striking recent progress, and the fourth "Ettore Majorana" International School of Mathematical Physics held at Erice, 1-15 June 1980 with the title Rigorous Atomic and Mqlecular Physics focussed on some of the recent advances. The first of these is the geometric method in the theory of scattering. Quantum mechanical scattering theory is an old and highly cultivated subject, but, until recently, many of its fundamental developments were technically very complicated and conceptually rather obscure. For example, one of the basic properties of a system of N particles moving under the influence of appropriately restricted short-range plus Coulomb forces is asymptotic completeness: the space of states is spanned by the bound states and scattering states. However, the proof of asymp­ totic. completeness for N bodies was achieved only with physically unsatisfactory restrictions on the nature of the interaction and even for N = 2 required an involved argument rather more subtle than the physical circumstances seemed to warrant. The reader will find in the present volume a very simple and physical proof of asymptotic completeness for N = 2 as well as an outline of the geometrical ideas which are currently being used to attack the problem for N > 2. (See the lectures of Enss.

The seventh Ettore Majorana International School of Mathematical Physics was :Jeld at the Centro della Cultura Scientifica Erice. Sicily, 1-15 July 1988. The present volume collects lecture notes on the session which was entitled Con8tructive Quantum Field Theory lI. The II refers to the fact that the first such school in 1973 was devoted ,0 the same subject. The school was a NATO Advanced Study Institute sponsored Jy the Italian Ministry of Scientific and Technological Research and the Regional 3icilian Government. At the time of the 1973 Erice School on Constructive Field Theory, the speakers :ould summarize a decade of effort on the solution of superrenormalizable models in two dimensional space-time leading to the verification of the axioms of relativistic :J. uantum field theory for these examples. The resulting lecture notes have proved ,0 be exceptionally useful and are still in print. In the decade and a half that have ~lapsed since that time, there has been much hard work with the ultimate objective of providing a rigorous mathematical foundation for the quantum field theories in four iimensional space-time that summarize a large fraction of our current understanding )f elementary particle physics: QCD and the electroweak theory. The lecture notes )f the 1988 school record the fact that, although this objective has not been reached, Important progress has been made. The ultraviolet stability of Yang-Mills theory In four dimensions has been treated and renormalizable (not superrenormalizable) models in two dimensional space-time, Gross-Neveu models, have been solved.

This volume, the fourth in the series "The Prostagiandin System", contains most of the presentations at the International School of Pharmacology on "Drugs Effecting Leukotrienes and other Eicosanoid pathways" held in Erice, Sicily, at the "Ettore Majorana Center" on 9-20 September 1984. The discovery of a new class of biologically active compounds is always exciting even if at the present time knowledge is advancing very rapidly; this is particu1arly true for the eicosanoids. Evidence for a pivotal role of arachidonic acid as a precursor of mediators and modulators of various cell functions is now weil established. This broad knowledge has stimulated the search for drugs capable of interfering with the eicosanoid system and since the discovery of the mechanism of action of Aspirin, new drugs have become available in order to act more specifica11y not only at the level of different enzymes involved in arachidonic acid conversion but also more selectively at the receptor si tes where the acti ve metaboli tes are effecti ve.In addition to this, several stable synthetic derivatives of endogenous unstable prostanoids mimicking their functions in a variety of physiopatho19gical processes are also of potential therapeutic interest. This volume will certainly help scientists and students wi th different interests related to those diseases that stern from arachidonic acid metabolites interactions in hypersensitivity phenomena and in host defence mechanisms.

The sixth Ettore Majorana International School of Mathematical Physics was held at the Centro della Cultura Scientifica Erice, Sicily, 1-14 July 1985. The present volume collects lecture notes on the ses­ sion which was devoted to Fundamental Problems of Gauge Field Theory. The School was a NATO Advanced Study Institute sponsored by the Italian Ministry of Public Education, the Italian Ministry of Scientific and Technological Research and the Regional Sicilian Government. As a result of the experimental and theoretical developments of the last two decades, gauge field theory, in one form or another, now pro­ vides the standard language for the description of Nature; QCD and the standard model of the electroweak interactions illustrate this point. It is a basic task of mathematical physics to provide a solid foundation for these developments by putting the theory in a physically transparent and mathematically rigorous form. The lectures and seminars of the school concentrated on the many unsolved problems which arise here, and on the general ideas and methods which have been proposed for their solution. In particular, we mention the use of rigorous renormalization group methods to obtain control over the continuum limit of lattice gauge field theories, the explora­ tion of the extraordinary enigmatic connections between Kac-Moody­ Virasoro algebras and string theory, and the systematic use of the theory of local algebras and indefinite metric spaces to classify the charged C* states in gauge field theories.