This book deals with the various thermodynamic concepts used for the analysis of nonlinear dynamical systems. The most important invariants used to characterize chaotic systems are introduced in a way that stresses the interconnections with thermodynamics and statistical mechanics. Among the subjects treated are probabilistic aspects of chaotic dynamics, the symbolic dynamics technique, information measures, the maximum entropy principle, general thermodynamic relations, spin systems, fractals and multifractals, expansion rate and information loss, the topological pressure, transfer operator...

The book is meant to be primarily a textbook. Therefore most of the examples of special thermodynamic systems are standards in different fields. The number of the examples, however, is restricted. For more applications we refer the reader to the rich literature on thermodynamics. The author hopes that the book, which is concerned above all with basic connections, will be interesting not only for students but also for academic teachers and other scientists who like the structural analysis of fundamentals in physics. According to the character of a textbook, this book is not intended to...