'The motivated reader will find this book fascinating. It presents, in a somewhat idiosyncratic but readable way, a personal, substantial, and interesting mathematical journey.' Laurent Saloff-Coste, Bulletin of the American Mathematical Society
Preface; 1. Introduction; Part I. The Analytic and Algebraic Classification: 2. The classification and the first main theorem; 3. NC-groups; 4. The B–NB classification; 5. NB-groups; 6. Other classes of locally compact groups; Appendix A. Semisimple groups and the Iwasawa decomposition; Appendix B. The characterisation of NB-algebras; Appendix C. The structure of NB-groups; Appendix D. Invariant differential operators and their diffusion kernels; Appendix E. Additional results. Alternative proofs and prospects; Part II. The Geometric Theory: 7. The geometric theory. An introduction; 8. The geometric NC-theorem; 9. Algebra and geometries on C-groups; 10. The end game in the C-theorem; 11. The metric classification; Appendix F. Retracts on general NB-groups (not necessarily simply connected); Part III. Homology Theory: 12. The homotopy and homology classification of connected Lie groups; 13. The polynomial homology for simply connected soluble groups; 14. Cohomology on Lie groups; Appendix G. Discrete groups; Epilogue; References; Index.