Kontsevich's Universal Formula for Deformation Quantization and the Campbell-Baker-Hausdorff Formula, I

We relate a universal formula for the deformation quantization of arbitrary Poisson structures proposed by Maxim Kontsevich to the Campbell-Baker-Hausdorff formula. Our basic thesis is that exponentiating a suitable deformation of the Poisson structure provides a prototype for such universal formulae.Comment: 48 pages, over 90 (small) epsf figures, uses some ams-latex package