This book offers a detailed presentation of results needed to prove the Morse Homology Theorem using classical techniques from algebraic topology and homotopy theory. The text presents results that were formerly scattered in the mathematical literature, in a single reference with complete and detailed proofs. The core material includes CW-complexes, Morse theory, hyperbolic dynamical systems (the Lamba-Lemma, the Stable/Unstable Manifold Theorem), transversality theory, the Morse-Smale-Witten boundary operator, and Conley index theory.

This book is based on the lecture notes from a course we taught at Penn State University during the fall of 2002. The main goal of the course was to give a complete and detailed proof of the Morse Homology Theorem (Theo rem 7.4) at a level appropriate for second year graduate students. The course was designed for students who had a basic understanding of singular homol ogy, CW-complexes, applications of the existence and uniqueness theorem for O.D.E.s to vector fields on smooth Riemannian manifolds, and Sard's Theo rem. We would like to thank the following students for their participation in...