Long-Range Interacting Systems Lecture Notes of the Les Houches Summer School: Volume 90, August 2008

This book collects together the lecture courses and seminars given at the Les Houches Summer School 2008 on Long-Range Interacting Systems, reviewing the state-of-the-art developments in this field and providing an essential background to future studies, all in writing that is accessible to Masters and PhD students and researchers wishing to enter this field. Leading scientists in different fields of mathematics and physics present their views on this fast growing and interdisciplinary field of research, exploring such topics as fundamental problems of probability, transport theory, equilibrium and non-equilibrium statistical mechanics, condensed matter physics, astrophysics and cosmology, physics of plasmas, and hydrodynamics. In particular, the book examines the thermodynamic and dynamical properties of systems with long-range interactions, which have been poorly understood until recently.

Prof. Leticia F. Cugliandolo, born in 1965, got her PhD in Physics from Universidad Nacional de La Plata, Argentina, in 1991. Subsequently, she spent a three year post-doc at Universita di Roma I, La Sapienza, and then moved to the Service de Physique de l'Etat Condense at Saclay (CEA) and Ecole Normale Superieure (ENS) de Paris for a second post-doctoral experience. In 1997 she became assistant professor at ENS Paris and in 2003 full professor at Universite Pierre et Marie Curie - Paris VI where she presently teaches and pursues her research acivities. Since January 2007 she has been the Director of the Ecole de Physique des Houches.
Dr. Thierry Dauxois took his PhD in 1993 from Dijon University (France) in collaboration with Los Alamos National Laboratory. In 1994, he became CNRS researcher at Ecole Normale Superieure in Lyon. He got a Marie Curie fellowship in 1996 to spend 6 months at Firenze University and a NATO fellowship in 1997 to spend one year at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California San Diego. His main field of research is nonlinear physics and statistical mechanics, with applications to biophysics, condensed matter and hydrodynamics.
Prof. Stefano Ruffo, born in 1954, got his Laurea in Physics from Florence University (Italy) in 1977. In 1987 he won a national competition for an Associate Professorship in Condensed Matter Physics at the University of Basilicata. He moved to the Faculty of Engineering, University of Florence, in 1991, where presently he teaches basic physics and dynamical systems. He is a member of the Advisory Board of Physica A (Elsevier) and an Editor of Communications in Nonlinear Science and Numerical Simulations (Elsevier). He has recently become a member of the C3 Commission (Statistical Physics) of the IUPAP.