Course abstract

With the gradual acceptance of "path integral" based "string theory" as a strong candidate for unification, knowledge of the nuances of the "path integral" formalism of QFT is indispensable for academic progression in this area. The applications of this versatile concept are also growing by the day, one of the cardinal ones being in pricing of complex financial assets. Scientific risk management by the investor fraternity has become of cardinal necessity for generating competitive returns and surviving in the marketplace. Derivatives have proven to be immensely useful in the management of financial risk. Their vitality can be gauged from the exponential growth in trading volumes as well as the advent of new structured products literally on a day to day basis. Derivatives in petroleum and natural gas industries in the United States are, now, well entrenched, and they are being extensively used in the electricity industry as well. This has called for advent of innovative methods for the pricing of such instruments. With enhanced computing power being accessible, the "path integral formalism" is gradually becoming the method of choice in this context.