February 2006
Intermediate to advanced
600 pages
8h 57m
English
In this Chapter we introduce some of the elementary constructs and ideas from the theory of representations of the 3D Euclidean rotation group. The most fundamental properties of representations of the rotation group ultimately have quaternionic origins, although we will not attempt to cover that connection in any depth here (for comprehensive accounts, see Edmonds [43] or Biedenharn and Louck [17,18]).
The mathematics of group theory—in particular of the rotation group—is an endless subject, and we will not attempt any rigorous treatment here (e.g., see Altmann [4], Edmonds [43], Gilmore [56], and van der Waerden [163]). However, from a practical computational ...