DESY 08{107 On the Advancements of Conformal Transformations and their Associated Symmetries in Geometry and Theoretical Physics1 H.A. Kastrup2 DESY, Theory Group Notkestr. 85, D-22603 Hamburg Germany PACS 03.70.+k, 11.25.Hf, 11.30.-j Dedicated to the memory of Julius Wess (1934-2007), colleague and friend for many years Abstract The historical developments of conformal transformations and symmetries are sketched: Their origin from stereographic projections of the globe, their blossoming in two dimen- sions within the field of analytic complex functions, the generic role of transformations by reciprocal radii in dimensions higher than two and their linearization in terms of poly- spherical coordinates by Darboux, Weyl's attempt to extend General Relativity, the slow rise of finite dimensional conformal transformations in classical field theories and the prob- arXiv:0808.2730v1 [physics.hist-ph] 20 Aug 2008 lem of their interpretation, then since about 1970 the rapid spread of their acceptance for asymptotic and structural problems in quantum field theories and beyond, up to the current AdS=CF T conjecture. The occasion for the present article: hundred years ago Bateman and Cunningham dis- covered the form invariance of Maxwell's equations for electromagnetism with respect to conformal space-time transformations. 1Invited contribution to the special issue (Sept./Oct. 2008) of Annalen der Physik (Berlin) comme- morating Hermann Minkowski's lecture on \Raum und Zeit", Sept. 1908, in Cologne. 2E-mail:
[email protected] Contents 1 Introduction 2 1.1 The occasion . 2 1.2 The issue . 4 1.2.1 Conformal mappings as point transformations .