Uploaded September 2024 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago

---

Speaker: Werner Nahm (DIAS)
Abstract: Mathematical interest in quantum field theory was
hampered by the lack of a definition that mathematicians could
remember. Here is one: A unitary euclidean quantum field theory
is a functor from a category of Riemannian manifolds (with boundaries)
to a category of Hilbert spaces (with linear maps). In the
non-unitary case, the latter have to be generalized to spaces of self-dual
Banach spaces. In the unitary case, the natural properties of the
categories (continuity, monoidal structure, self-adjointness)
are supposed to be respected by the functor.
The talk will explain, how the usual physics emerges from
this axiom.