Noncommutative geometry and theoretical physics (Q909761)

The main aim of the author's survey is to describe the concepts of noncommutative geometry related to and playing an important role in theoretical physics during the last fifteen years. Noncommutative geometry has many recent applications in quantum field theory, statistical physics, solid states where it has been used to explain the quantum Hall effect, for instance. The aim motivates the structure of this paper and the rules of its recommended reading. In Section 2 the author introduces the universal differential algebra \(\Omega\) (\({\mathcal A})\) of an associative algebra \({\mathcal A}\) and deals with its different constructions, particularly, by giving some examples. Further, in Section 3 he defines the Hochschild homology groups \({\mathcal H}^*({\mathcal A})\) of the algebra \({\mathcal A}\) which have to play the role of the De Rham complex \(\Lambda^*(X)\) of differential forms on X where X is a smooth manifold. The noncommutative counterpart of the De Rham cohomology, being a periodic cyclic cohomology, is described in Sections 4 and 5. In Section 6 the author studies the positive cocycles, and in Section 7 the entire cyclic cohomology. In the next Section he examines the relation with the other approach to cyclic cohomology via the Loday-Quillen theorem. The noncommutative analogue of vector bundles playing a fundamental role in physics, namely in classical field theory, is described in Section 9. The index theory for elliptic operators is generalized to the noncommutative case in Section 10. The author makes the end point of his presentation by discussing the ideas developed in view of the bivariant K-theory.