High energy limits of various actions

Abstract

This is a thesis submitted for the cand.scient. degree at the University of Oslo. It is meant to give a thorough presentation of two methods for deriving tensionless limits of strings, and the analogue in other models. Also, the applicability of these methods are investigated by explicitly going through the calculations for a variety of models. An important part of the thesis is the study of constrained Hamiltonian systems.