Branching Brownian motion (BBM) is a classical object in probability theory with deep connections to partial differential equations. This book highlights the connection to classical extreme value theory and to the theory of mean-field spin glasses in statistical mechanics. Starting with a concise review of classical extreme value statistics and a basic introduction to mean-field spin glasses, the author then focuses on branching Brownian motion. Here, the classical results of Bramson on th...

The proceedings of the 2005 les Houches summer school on Mathematical Statistical Physics give and broad and clear overview on this fast developing area of interest to both physicists and mathematicians. - Introduction to a field of math with many interdisciplinary connections in physics, biology, and computer science - Roadmap to the next decade of mathematical statistical mechanics - Volume for reference years to come

Focusing on the mathematics that lies at the intersection of probability theory, statistical physics, combinatorics and computer science, this volume collects together lecture notes on recent developments in the area. The common ground of these subjects is perhaps best described by the three terms in the title: Random Walks, Random Fields and Disordered Systems. The specific topics covered include a study of Branching Brownian Motion from the perspective of disordered (spin-glass) systems,...

This monograph provides a concise presentation of a mathematical approach to metastability, a wide-spread phenomenon in the dynamics of non-linear systems - physical, chemical, biological or economic - subject to the action of temporal random forces typically referred to as noise, based on potential theory of reversible Markov processes.The authors shed new light on the metastability phenomenon as a sequence of visits of the path of the process to different metastable sets, and foc...