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In group theory, the symmetry group of a geometric object is the group of all transformations under which the object is invariant, endowed with the group operation of composition. Such a transformation is an invertible mapping of the ambient space which takes the object to itself, and which preserves all the relevant structure of the object.
In a symmetry group, the group elements are the symmetry operations (not the symmetry elements), and the binary combination consists of applying first one symmetry operation and then the other. An example is the sequence of a C 4 rotation about the z-axis and a reflection in the xy-plane, denoted σ(xy) C 4 .
Group theory has three main historical sources: number theory, the theory of algebraic equations, and geometry.The number-theoretic strand was begun by Leonhard Euler, and developed by Gauss's work on modular arithmetic and additive and multiplicative groups related to quadratic fields.
A rigorous understanding of symmetry explains fundamental observations in quantum chemistry, and in the applied areas of spectroscopy and crystallography. The theory and application of symmetry to these areas of physical science draws heavily on the mathematical area of group theory. [26]
For example, N = 4 super-Yang–Mills theory has this symmetry while general relativity does not although other theories of gravity such as conformal gravity do. The 'action' of a field theory is an invariant under all the symmetries of the theory. Much of modern theoretical physics is to do with speculating on the various symmetries the ...
The symmetry group of an object is sometimes also called its full symmetry group, as opposed to its proper symmetry group, the intersection of its full symmetry group with E + (3), which consists of all direct isometries, i.e., isometries preserving orientation. For a bounded object, the proper symmetry group is called its rotation group.
Geometric group theory grew out of combinatorial group theory that largely studied properties of discrete groups via analyzing group presentations, which describe groups as quotients of free groups; this field was first systematically studied by Walther von Dyck, student of Felix Klein, in the early 1880s, [2] while an early form is found in the 1856 icosian calculus of William Rowan Hamilton ...
Various physical systems, such as crystals and the hydrogen atom, may be modelled by symmetry groups. Thus group theory and the closely related representation theory have many important applications in physics, chemistry, and materials science. Group theory is also central to public key cryptography.