The Poincaré Seminar is held twice a year at the Institut Henri Poincaré
in Paris. This volume contains the lectures of the 2002 seminars. The
main topic of the first one was the vacuum energy, in particular the
Casimir effect and the nature of the cosmological constant. The second
one concentrated on renormalization, giving a comprehensive account of
its mathematical structure and applications to high energy physics,
statistical mechanics and classical mechanics.
Students will find excellent introductions to the subjects with further
lectures leading to the frontiers of experimental and theoretical
research, scientists will profit from contributions by outstanding
experts.