The Classical Dynamics of Particles

The Classical Dynamics of Galilean and Lorentz Relativity has been designed to serve either as an independent graduate course in dynamics or as a segment of a graduate theoretical physics course. The book begins with a general introduction and a rather extensive discussion of the special theory of relativity, including a section on tachyons. Separate chapters follow on the variational derivation of Lagrangian dynamical equations of charged particle motion and spin angular momentum; variational derivation of Noether’s theorem; and canonical formalism and Dirac’s extension of Hamiltonian dynamics and treatment of constraints. The “”No-Interaction Theorem”” of Wigner and Van Dam and various efforts to construct a many-particle dynamics compatible with the special theory of relativity are also discussed. The final chapter presents two applications of group theory in classical the factorization of the dynamical matrix and the construction of a canonical formalism from a symmetry group.