Course Information

 WarmUp Exercise

 Homework

 Syllabus

 Bulletin Board

Notice: You should consider this syllabus as an approximation to what we will do. This is the first time this course has been offered in in current form, and the first time Dr. Gavrin has taught 517 in any form. There may be significant deviations from this syllabus if they seem necessary.

Catalogue Description:
416 Thermal Physics (3 cr)
Temperature, equations of state, first and second laws of thermodynamics, entropy and applications, kinetic theory, transport processes, statistical mechanics.

517 Statistical Physics (3 cr)
Laws of thermodynamics; Boltzmann and quantum statistical distributions, with applications to properties of gases, specific heats of solids, paramagnetism, black-body radiation, and Bose-Einstein condensation; Boltzmann transport equation and transport properties of gases; Brownian motion and fluctuation phenomena.

Schedule of topics:

January

Monday, January 13: No Class (Instructor out of Town)
Wednesday, January 12: No Class (Instructor out of Town)

Monday, January 20: No Class (Martin Luther King Day)
Wednesday, January 22: Introduction to Statistical Methods; Binomial and Gaussian Distributions

Monday, January 27: Random Walks and Other Applications.
Wednesday, January 29: States, Systems and Ensembles; The Fundamental Postulate
Friday, January 31: Problem Set #1 due 1/31/03

February

Monday, February 3: Interactions among systems, 1^st law of thermodynamics
Wednesday, February 5: Equilibrium; Entropy; Reversibility; and Temperature.
Friday, February 7: Problem Set #2 due 2/7/03

Monday, February 10: Heat Resevoirs; General Interactions; more about Entropy
Wednesday, February 12: Applications of Statistical Thermodynamics
Friday, February 14: Problem Set #3 due 2/14/03

Monday, February 17: Exam #1
Wednesday, February 19: Specific heat, calorimetry and entropy changes

Monday, February 24: Review of Thermodynamics
Wednesday, February 26: Maxwell Relations and thermodynamic potentials.
Friday, February 18: Problem Set #4 due 2/28/03

March

Monday, March 3: Applications of Thermodynamics
Wednesday, March 5: More applications of thermodynamics
Friday, March 7: Problem Set #5 due 3/7/03

Monday, March 10: Heat engines and refigerators
Wednesday, March 12: Thermodynamics in a magnetic field

March 17-21: Spring Break

Monday, March 24: Test #2
Wednesday, March 26: Canonical Ensemble; Boltzmann Factor

Monday, March 31: Applications of the canonical ensemble, Equipartion theorem

April

Wednesday, April 2: Further applications, kinetic theory
Friday, April 4: Problem Set #6 due 4/4/03

Monday, April 7: Equilibrium between phases
Wednesday, April 9: Critical Phenomena
Friday, April 11: Problem Set #7 due 4/11/03

Monday, April 14: Multicomponent systems
Wednesday, April 16: Quantum Statistics
Friday, April 18: Problem Set #8 due 4/18/03

Monday, April 21: Blackbody radiation
Wednesday, April 23: Applications of FD statistics
Friday, April 25: Problem Set #9 due 4/25/03

Monday, April 28: Debye Theory of Specific Heat
Wednesday, April 30: Mean field theory

May

Monday, May 5: Multicomponent systems

Wednesday, May 7: Final Exam in LD021
Note the change in room number!