Mathematicians will find relevant information about the algorithmic aspects. Researchers in computer science and engineering will find the required mathematical background. Being self-contained the book is accessible to graduate students and even, for invaluable parts of it, to undergraduate students. This second edition contains several recent results, on discriminants of symmetric matrices, real root isolation, global optimization, quantitative results on semi-algebraic sets and the first single exponential algorithm computing their first Betti number.