This book consists of a series of introductory lectures on mirror symmetry and its surrounding topics. These lectures were provided by participants in the PIMS Superschool for Derived Categories and D-branes in July 2016. Together, they form a comprehensive introduction to the field that integrates perspectives from mathematicians and physicists alike.These proceedings provide a pleasant and broad introduction into modern research topics surrounding string theory and mirror symmetry that is approachable to readers new to the subjects. These topics include constructions of various mirror pairs, approaches to mirror symmetry, connections to homological algebra, and physical motivations. Of particular interest is the connection between GLSMs, D-branes, birational geometry, and derived categories, which is explained both from a physical and mathematical perspective. The introductory lectures provided herein highlight many features of this emerging field and give concrete connections between the physics and the math.Mathematical readers will come away with a broader perspective on this field and a bit of physical intuition, while physicists will gain an introductory overview of the developing mathematical realization of physical predictions.

Gives a broad perspective on the field, perfect for a graduate student seminar

Abelian and Triangulated Categories (C. Hanratty).- Derived Categories and Derived Functors (N.K. Chidambaram).- Introduction to Quivers (M. Chinen).- Semi-orthogonal Decompositions of Derived Categories (Y. Liu).- Introduction to Bridgeland Stability Conditions (R. Tramel).- A Brief Introduction to Geometric Invariant Theory (N. Grieve).- Birational Geometry and Derived Categories (C. Diemer).- Introduction to Mirror Symmetry (R. Hughes).- Batyrev Mirror Symmetry (M. Talpo).- Differential Graded Categories (A.A. Takeda).- Introduction to Symplectic Geometry and Fukaya Category (A.Z. Zhang).- Homological Mirror Symmetry (A. Harder).- The Syz Conjecture Via Homological Mirror Symmetry (D. Bejleri).- The Derived Category of Coherent Sheaves and B-model Topological String Theory (S. Pietromonaco).- Introduction to Topological String Theories (K. Osuga).- An Overview of B-branes in Gauged Linear Sigma Models (N. Ishtiaque).