PHY293F1 - Particles and Waves
Particles Section Homepage - Fall 2009

ANNOUNCEMENTS

8 December 2009 - Prof. Walker will be available to answer questions from 11 AM - 1 PM Wednesday, all day Thursday (except 3-5 PM for the Physics Holiday Party), and 11 AM - noon and after 2:30 PM on Friday. If there is demand, a more official office hour will be scheduled for later on Friday. Good luck on all your exams and have a good holiday!

Announcements from previous days can be found here.

COURSE OUTLINE

Course Outline contains syllabus information

Below is a tentative schedule including textbook section references for each lecture. This schedule may be updated as the course progresses. After each day of classes, lecture notes will be posted.

The textbook for the course is An Introduction to Thermal Physics by Daniel Schroeder, copyright 2000 by Addison Wesley Longman. There are copies of the text and other references available on short term loan from the Gerstein and Physics libraries.

Class	Topics	Textbook Sections	Notes
1	Overview of statistical mechanics		Class notes
2	Temperature and review of thermodynamics	1.1 - 1.4; 1.6	Class notes
3	Two-state system and multiplicity	2.1 - 2.3	Class notes
4	Large systems and multiplicity	2.4	Class notes
5	Entropy	2.6	Class notes
6	Temperature and entropy	3.1 - 3.2 (see also 2.5 for ideal gas)	Class notes
7	Paramagnetism	3.3	Class notes
8	Pressure and thermodynamic identity	3.4, 3.5, 5.1, 5.2	Class notes
9	Boltzmann factor and partition function	6.1	Class notes
10	Paramagnetism revisited	6.2	Class notes
11	Partition function	6.3, 6.5 - 6.6	Class notes
	Midterm Test - Thursday 19 Nov.	Covers all material from Lectures 1 - 10
12	Ideal gas	6.7	Class notes
13	Blackbody radiation	7.4	Class notes
14	Blackbody radiation continued	7.4	Class notes
15	Debye theory of solids	7.5	Class notes
16	Chemical potential, Gibbs Factor, Quantum statistics	5.3, 7.1, 7.2	Class notes
17	Degenerate Fermi gases	7.3	Class notes
18	Degenerate Fermi gases (cont.)	7.3	Class notes

PROBLEM SETS

Problem sets will be posted here approximately a week prior to the due date. No paper copies of the problem set will be distributed in class.

Problem sets are to be handed in to the course drop box in the basement of the McLennan Physical Labs at 5 PM on the Monday following their assignment. Late problem sets (those received after 5:10 PM) will not be accepted.