These lecture notes are an informal introduction to the theory of
computational complexity and its links to quantum computing and statistical
mechanics.Comment: references updated, reprint available from
  http://itp.nat.uni-magdeburg.de/~mertens/papers/complexity.shtm

Mertens, Stephan

English

arXiv

Compared to the traditionally close rela-tionship between physics and mathe-matics, an exchange of ideas and meth-ods between physics and computer science barely exists. However, the few interac-tions that have gone beyond Fortran program-ming and the quest for faster computers have been successful and have provided surprising insights in both fields. This is particularly true for the mutual exchange between statistical mechanics and the theory of computational complexity. Here, I discuss this exchange in a manner directed at physicists with little or no knowledge of the theory. The measure of complexity The branch of theoretical computer science known as computational complexity is con-cerned with classifying problems according to the computational resources required to solv

Computational Complexity for Physicists

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