Muon physics

This review on muon physics starts with some introductory and historical remarks. In section 2 the basic properties of the muon and its neutrino are summarized including a short resume of possible lepton number schemes and of muon-electron universality. Section 3 which is perhaps the central part of the article deals with the weak interactions of the muon, i.e. discusses all its allowed and its (perhaps) forbidden decay modes, and its reactions with nucleons. Section 4 is devoted to electromagnetic properties of muons such as the magnetic moment, the g-factor and radiative corrections to bound muonic systems, as well as other topics. The final section 5 deals with the muon as a probe in particle and nuclear physics, stressing a few applications that seem particularly beautiful and instructive. A short appendix finally, defines a few symbols that appear in the text and summarizes the notation. (Auth.)