Renormalization Theory

The present volume collects lecture notes from the session of the International School of Mathematical Physics 'Ettore Majorana' on Renormalization Theory that took place in Erice (Sicily), August 17 to August 31, 1975. The School was a NATO Advanced Study Institute sponsored by the Italian Ministry of Public Education, the Italian Minis­ try of Scientific and Technological Research, and the Regional Sicilian Government. Renormalization theory has, by now, acquired forty years of history. The present volume assumes a general acquaintance with the elementary facts of the subject as they might appear in an introductory course in quantum field theory. For more recent significant developments it provides a systematic intro­ duction as well as a detailed discussion of the existing state of knowledge. In particular analytic and dimensional renorma­ lization, normal product technique, and the Bogoliubov-Shirkov­ Epstein-Glaser method are treated, with applications to physically important gauge theories. All the preceding deals with perturbative renormalization theory. In recent years there has been an interesting development of non-perturbative renormalization theory in models in space-times of two and three dimensions, with the use of the methods of constructive field theory. Despite the simplicity of these models, the results are of significance because they are exact and answer a number of questions of principle. There are parts of renormalization theory which are not well understood, for instance the renormalization theory of non-renormalizable interactions.