Comprehensive book on group theory for physicists?

There is a book titled "Group theory and Physics" by Sternberg that covers the basics, including crystal groups, Lie groups, representations. I think it's a good introduction to the topic.

To quote a review on Amazon (albeit the only one):

"This book is an excellent introduction to the use of group theory in physics, especially in crystallography, special relativity and particle physics. Perhaps most importantly, Sternberg includes a highly accessible introduction to representation theory near the beginning of the book. All together, this book is an excellent place to get started in learning to use groups and representations in physics."


There is a new book called Physics From Symmetry which is written specifically for physicists and includes a long, very illustrative introduction to group theory. I especially liked that here concepts like representation or Lie algebra aren't only defined, but motivated and explained in terms that physicists understand. Plus no concepts are introduced which aren't needed for physics, which was always a big problem for me when I read books for mathematicians. Group theory is a very big subject and mathematicians find a lot of things interesting that aren't very relevant for physicists.

Although if you're looking for mathematical rigor, this may be the wrong book and I would recommend Naive Lie Theory by Stillwell.

In fact, my recommondation would be to read both. The first one to understand what concepts are important for physics and to get a first idea for the motivation behind them and then Stillwell's book in order to get an idea how mathematicians think about these subjects.


Anthony Zee just came out with Group Theory in a Nutshell for Physicists - covers most of what a undergrad physics student needs including finite groups and representations, except Young diagrams.