by E V Shuryak (Novosibirsk)

This is probably the only textbook available that gathers QCD, many-body theory and phase transitions in one volume. The presentation is pedagogical and readable. It provides materials interesting to both students and researchers of astrophysics, nuclear physics and high energy physics.

• The QCD Vacuum:
  • The Theoretical Introduction
  • Introduction to Lattice Field Theories
  • Topological Effects in QCD and Related Models
  • Correlators and Hadrons: Introductory Hadronic Physics
  • The QCD Sum Rules Based on the Operator Product Expansion
  • The Correlators and the Sum Rules Beyond the OPE
  • Hadronic Spectroscopy on the Lattice
  • Summary on the QCD Vacuum Phenomenology
• Macroscopic Excitations of the QCD Vacuum:
  • Hadronic Matter Versus Quark-Gluon Plasma
  • Perturbative Theory of the Quark-Gluon Plasma
  • Instantons in Matter
  • Thermodynamics on the Lattice
  • Phase Transitions
• Macroscopic Excitations in Experiment:
  • Formation of Excited Matter in High Energy Colisions
  • Collective Phenomena in High Energy Collisions
  • Diagnostics of Excited Matter
  • The Interferometric “Microscope”