Causal symmetric spaces

the long version

This book introduces researchers and graduate students to the concepts of causal symmetric spaces. To date, results of recent studies considered "standard" by specialists have not been widely published. This book brings this information to students and researchers in geometry and analysis of causal symmetric spaces. During the last several years, a fairly complete structure theory of irreducible causal symmetric spaces has emerged. This book is the first to present this theory with exhaustive proofs. The final chapters provide an introduction to the applications of this topic to harmonic analysis.