The main goal of this book is to establish the fundamental theorems of the subject in full and rigourous detail. In particular, the book contains complete proofs of Gromov's compactness theorem for spheres, of the gluing theorem for spheres, and of the associatively of quantum multiplication in the semipositive case. The book can also serve as an introduction to current work in symplectic topology.

Over the last number of years powerful new methods in analysis and topology have led to the development of the modern global theory of symplectic topology, including several striking and important results. The first edition of Introduction to Symplectic Topology was published in 1995. The book was the first comprehensive introduction to the subject and became a key text in the area. A significantly revised second edition was published in 1998 introducing new sections and updates on the fast-developing area. This new third edition includes updates and new material to bring the book right up-to-date.

Symplectic and contact geometry naturally emerged from the mathematical description of classical physics. The discovery of new rigidity phenomena and properties satisfied by these geometric structures launched a new research field worldwide. The intense activity of many European research groups in this field is reflected by the ESF Research Networking Programme "Contact And Symplectic Topology" (CAST). The lectures of the Summer School in Nantes (June 2011) and of the CAST Summer School in Budapest (July 2012) provide a nice panorama of many aspects of the present status of contact and symplectic topology. The notes of the minicourses offer a gentle introduction to topics which have developed in an amazing speed in the recent past. These topics include 3-dimensional and higher dimensional contact topology, Fukaya categories, asymptotically holomorphic methods in contact topology, bordered Floer homology, embedded contact homology, and flexibility results for Stein manifolds.

This monograph provides an accessible introduction to the applications of pseudoholomorphic curves in symplectic and contact geometry, with emphasis on dimensions four and three. The first half of the book focuses on McDuff's characterization of symplectic rational and ruled surfaces, one of the classic early applications of holomorphic curve theory. The proof presented here uses the language of Lefschetz fibrations and pencils, thus it includes some background on these topics, in addition to a survey of the required analytical results on holomorphic curves. Emphasizing applications rather than technical results, the analytical survey mostly refers to other sources for proofs, while aiming to provide precise statements that are widely applicable, plus some informal discussion of the analytical ideas behind them. The second half of the book then extends this program in two complementary directions: (1) a gentle introduction to Gromov-Witten theory and complete proof of the classification of uniruled symplectic 4-manifolds; and (2) a survey of punctured holomorphic curves and their applications to questions from 3-dimensional contact topology, such as classifying the symplectic fillings of planar contact manifolds. This book will be particularly useful to graduate students and researchers who have basic literacy in symplectic geometry and algebraic topology, and would like to learn how to apply standard techniques from holomorphic curve theory without dwelling more than necessary on the analytical details. This book is also part of the Virtual Series on Symplectic Geometry http://www.springer.com/series/16019

The method of using the moduli space of pseudo-holomorphic curves on a symplectic manifold was introduced by Mikhail Gromov in 1985. From the appearance of Gromov's original paper until today this approach has been the most important tool in global symplectic geometry. To produce numerical invariants of these manifolds using this method requires constructing a fundamental cycle associated with moduli spaces. This volume brings together three approaches to constructing the “virtual” fundamental cycle for the moduli space of pseudo-holomorphic curves. All approaches are based on the idea of local Kuranishi charts for the moduli space. Workers in the field will get a comprehensive understanding of the details of these constructions and the assumptions under which they can be made. These techniques and results will be essential in further applications of this approach to producing invariants of symplectic manifolds.

An accessible introduction to the intersection theory of punctured holomorphic curves and its applications in topology.

This book explains the foundations of holomorphic curve theory in contact geometry. By using a particular geometric problem as a starting point the authors guide the reader into the subject. As such it ideally serves as preparation and as entry point for a deeper study of the analysis underlying symplectic field theory. An introductory chapter sets the stage explaining some of the basic notions of contact geometry and the role of holomorphic curves in the field. The authors proceed to the heart of the material providing a detailed exposition about finite energy planes and periodic orbits (chapter 4) to disk filling methods and applications (chapter 9). The material is self-contained. It includes a number of technical appendices giving the geometric analysis foundations for the main results, so that one may easily follow the discussion. Graduate students as well as researchers who want to learn the basics of this fast developing theory will highly appreciate this accessible approach taken by the authors.

The first part of a two-volume set offering a systematic explanation of symplectic topology. This volume covers the basic materials of Hamiltonian dynamics and symplectic geometry.

The papers collected in this volume are contributions to the 43rd session of the Seminaire ́ de mathematiques ́ superieures ́ (SMS) on “Morse Theoretic Methods in Nonlinear Analysis and Symplectic Topology.” This session took place at the Universite ́ de Montreal ́ in July 2004 and was a NATO Advanced Study Institute (ASI). The aim of the ASI was to bring together young researchers from various parts of the world and to present to them some of the most signi cant recent advances in these areas. More than 77 mathematicians from 17 countries followed the 12 series of lectures and participated in the lively exchange of ideas. The lectures covered an ample spectrum of subjects which are re ected in the present volume: Morse theory and related techniques in in nite dim- sional spaces, Floer theory and its recent extensions and generalizations, Morse and Floer theory in relation to string topology, generating functions, structure of the group of Hamiltonian di?eomorphisms and related dynamical problems, applications to robotics and many others. We thank all our main speakers for their stimulating lectures and all p- ticipants for creating a friendly atmosphere during the meeting. We also thank Ms. Diane Belanger ́ , our administrative assistant, for her help with the organi- tion and Mr. Andre ́ Montpetit, our technical editor, for his help in the preparation of the volume.

This book is devoted to pseudo-holomorphic curve methods in symplectic geometry. It contains an introduction to symplectic geometry and relevant techniques of Riemannian geometry, proofs of Gromov's compactness theorem, an investigation of local properties of holomorphic curves, including positivity of intersections, and applications to Lagrangian embeddings problems. The chapters are based on a series of lectures given previously by the authors M. Audin, A. Banyaga, P. Gauduchon, F. Labourie, J. Lafontaine, F. Lalonde, Gang Liu, D. McDuff, M.-P. Muller, P. Pansu, L. Polterovich, J.C. Sikorav. In an attempt to make this book accessible also to graduate students, the authors provide the necessary examples and techniques needed to understand the applications of the theory. The exposition is essentially self-contained and includes numerous exercises.