After a century of successes, physicists still feel the need to probe the limits of the validity of theories based on special relativity. Canonical approaches to quantum gravity, non-commutative geometry, string theory and unification scenarios predict tiny violations of Lorentz invariance at high energies.

The present book, based on a recent seminar devoted to such frontier problems, contains reviews of the foundations of special relativity and the implications of Poincaré invariance as well as comprehensive accounts of experimental results and proposed tests.

The book addresses, besides researchers in the field, everyone interested in the conceptual and empirical foundations of our knowledge about space, time and matter.

From the reviews:

"In the last decade and a half, many scientists have come to believe that special relativity, as Einstein formulated it, will need to be modified to accommodate a quantum theory of gravity. the volume presents an excellent survey of current research on Lorentz symmetry. Most of the book should be accessible to graduate students and researchers who are interested in the field . provide abundant references, which should be quite valuable in a field with as many counterintuitive features as Lorentz violation research." (Brett D Altschul, Classical and Quantum Gravity, Vol. 24, 2007)

Inhalt
Historical and Philosophical Aspects.- Isotropy of Inertia: A Sensitive Early Experimental Test.- The Challenge of Practice: Einstein, Technological Development and Conceptual Innovation.- Foundation and Formalism.- Foundations of Special Relativity Theory.- Algebraic and Geometric Structures in Special Relativity.- Quantum Theory in Accelerated Frames of Reference.- Vacuum Fluctuations, Geometric Modular Action and Relativistic Quantum Information Theory.- Spacetime Metric from Local and Linear Electrodynamics: A New Axiomatic Scheme.- Violations of Lorentz Invariance?.- Overview of the Standard Model Extension: Implications and Phenomenology of Lorentz Violation.- Anything Beyond Special Relativity?.- Doubly Special Relativity as a Limit of Gravity.- Corrections to Flat-Space Particle Dynamics Arising from Space Granularity.- Experimental Search.- Test Theories for Lorentz Invariance.- Test of Lorentz Invariance Using a Continuously Rotating Optical Resonator.- A Precision Test of the Isotropy of the Speed of Light Using Rotating Cryogenic Optical Cavities.- Rotating Resonator-Oscillator Experiments to Test Lorentz Invariance in Electrodynamics.- Recent Experimental Tests of Special Relativity.- Experimental Test of Time Dilation by Laser Spectroscopy on Fast Ion Beams.- Tests of Lorentz Symmetry in the Spin-Coupling Sector.- Do Evanescent Modes Violate Relativistic Causality?.