An introduction to the fundamentals of the renormalization group in critical phenomena

The fundamental concepts underlying the application of the renormalization group and related techniques to critical phenomena are reviewed at an elementary level. Topics discussed include: the definition of the renormalization group as a functional integral over high momentum components of the spin field, the behaviour of the renormalization group near the fixed point and the derivation of scaling, Wilson's approximate recursion relation, trivial and non-trivial fixed points of isotropic spin systems near d = 4, Feynman graph expansions for critical exponents, ? = 4 ? d and 1/n-expansions, the derivation of exact recursion relations and co-ordinate space transformations for d = 2 Ising systems