In geometry and physics, spinors are elements of a complex vector space that can be associated with Euclidean space. Like geometric vectors and more general tensors, spinors transform linearly when the Euclidean space is subjected to a slight (infinitesimal) rotation. However, when a sequence of such small rotations is composed (integrated) to form an overall final rotation, the resulting spinor transformation depends on which sequence of small rotations was used. Unlike vectors and tensors, a spinor transforms to its negative when the space is continuously rotated through a complete turn from 0° to 360°. This property characterizes spinors: spinors can be viewed as the "square roots" of vectors.
In the mathematical field of representation theory, a weight of an algebra A over a field F is an algebra homomorphism from A to F, or equivalently, a one-dimensional representation of A over F. It is the algebra analogue of a multiplicative character of a group. The importance of the concept, however, stems from its application to representations of Lie algebras and hence also to representations of algebraic and Lie groups. In this context, a weight of a representation is a generalization of the notion of an eigenvalue, and the corresponding eigenspace is called a weight space.
In group theory, the induced representation is a representation of a group, G, which is constructed using a known representation of a subgroup H. Given a representation of H, the induced representation is, in a sense, the "most general" representation of G that extends the given one. Since it is often easier to find representations of the smaller group H than of G, the operation of forming induced representations is an important tool to construct new representations.
In mathematics, specifically in the representation theory of groups and algebras, an irreducible representation or irrep of an algebraic structure is a nonzero representation that has no proper nontrivial subrepresentation , with closed under the action of .
In mathematics, more specifically in group theory, the character of a group representation is a function on the group that associates to each group element the trace of the corresponding matrix. The character carries the essential information about the representation in a more condensed form. Georg Frobenius initially developed representation theory of finite groups entirely based on the characters, and without any explicit matrix realization of representations themselves. This is possible because a complex representation of a finite group is determined by its character. The situation with representations over a field of positive characteristic, so-called "modular representations", is more delicate, but Richard Brauer developed a powerful theory of characters in this case as well. Many deep theorems on the structure of finite groups use characters of modular representations.
In mathematical field of representation theory, a quaternionic representation is a representation on a complex vector space V with an invariant quaternionic structure, i.e., an antilinear equivariant map
In mathematics, a complex representation is a representation of a group on a complex vector space. Sometimes, the term complex representation is reserved for a representation on a complex vector space that is neither real nor pseudoreal (quaternionic). In other words, the group elements are expressed as complex matrices, and the complex conjugate of a complex representation is a different, non-equivalent representation. For compact groups, the Frobenius-Schur indicator can be used to tell whether a representation is real, complex, or pseudo-real.
The representation theory of groups is a part of mathematics which examines how groups act on given structures.
In mathematics, and especially the discipline of representation theory, the Schur indicator, named after Issai Schur, or Frobenius–Schur indicator describes what invariant bilinear forms a given irreducible representation of a compact group on a complex vector space has. It can be used to classify the irreducible representations of compact groups on real vector spaces.
In mathematics, if G is a group and ρ is a linear representation of it on the vector space V, then the dual representationρ* is defined over the dual vector space V* as follows:
In mathematics, a Hermitian symmetric space is a Hermitian manifold which at every point has an inversion symmetry preserving the Hermitian structure. First studied by Élie Cartan, they form a natural generalization of the notion of Riemannian symmetric space from real manifolds to complex manifolds.
In mathematics, the spinor concept as specialised to three dimensions can be treated by means of the traditional notions of dot product and cross product. This is part of the detailed algebraic discussion of the rotation group SO(3).
In mathematics, the spin representations are particular projective representations of the orthogonal or special orthogonal groups in arbitrary dimension and signature. More precisely, they are representations of the spin groups, which are double covers of the special orthogonal groups. They are usually studied over the real or complex numbers, but they can be defined over other fields.
In mathematics, the main results concerning irreducible unitary representations of the Lie group SL(2,R) are due to Gelfand and Naimark (1946), V. Bargmann (1947), and Harish-Chandra (1952).
In mathematics, a prehomogeneous vector space (PVS) is a finite-dimensional vector space V together with a subgroup G of the general linear group GL(V) such that G has an open dense orbit in V. Prehomogeneous vector spaces were introduced by Mikio Sato in 1970 and have many applications in geometry, number theory and analysis, as well as representation theory. The irreducible PVS were classified by Sato and Tatsuo Kimura in 1977, up to a transformation known as "castling". They are subdivided into two types, according to whether the semisimple part of G acts prehomogeneously or not. If it doesn't then there is a homogeneous polynomial on V which is invariant under the semisimple part of G.
Representation theory is a branch of mathematics that studies abstract algebraic structures by representing their elements as linear transformations of vector spaces, and studies modules over these abstract algebraic structures. In essence, a representation makes an abstract algebraic object more concrete by describing its elements by matrices and their algebraic operations. The theory of matrices and linear operators is well-understood, so representations of more abstract objects in terms of familiar linear algebra objects helps glean properties and sometimes simplify calculations on more abstract theories.
This is a glossary of representation theory in mathematics.
In mathematics, specifically in representation theory, a semisimple representation is a linear representation of a group or an algebra that is a direct sum of simple representations. It is an example of the general mathematical notion of semisimplicity.
In mathematics, the representation theory of semisimple Lie algebras is one of the crowning achievements of the theory of Lie groups and Lie algebras. The theory was worked out mainly by E. Cartan and H. Weyl and because of that, the theory is also known as the Cartan–Weyl theory. The theory gives the structural description and classification of a finite-dimensional representation of a semisimple Lie algebra ; in particular, it gives a way to parametrize irreducible finite-dimensional representations of a semisimple Lie algebra, the result known as the theorem of the highest weight.
In quantum mechanics, symmetry operations are of importance in giving information about solutions to a system. Typically these operations form a mathematical group, such as the rotation group SO(3) for spherically symmetric potentials. The representation theory of these groups leads to irreducible representations, which for SO(3) gives the angular momentum ket vectors of the system.
