Open Quantum Systems I

This is the ?rst in a series of three volumes dedicated to the lecture notes of the Summer School ”Open Quantum Systems” which took place at the Institut Fourier in Grenoble from June 16th to July 4th 2003. The contributions presented in these volumes are revised and expanded versions of the notes provided to the students during the School. Closed vs. Open Systems By de?nition, the time evolution of a closed physical systemS is deterministic. It is usually described by a differential equation x