Physics 437: Thermodynamics & Statistical Physics with Professor Mark Schneider
Spring 2000

Science 1132; Office hours: by appointment, use schedule on door
Phone x3018
Schneidm@grinnell.edu

Text: An Introduction to Thermal Physics by Daniel V. Schroeder

Grading
Tentative Schedule

The topic of this course is essentially attempting impossible problems. You know from your mechanics course that we can still solve mechanics problems that have two participating objects (remember effective potentials and orbit theory?). Unfortunately, add a third object, and the solution turns to "well, we can do that on a computer, at least in principle." But what if we have a lot of objects, say 6.02 x 1023 of them? This is the seemingly hopeless province of Thermal Physics.

What is normally taught in a Thermal Physics course has two distinct faces. The oldest one, classical thermodynamics, is a set of hard-won quantities that are variants of energy, plus the mysterious quantity known as entropy. By themselves, these are very obscure, and I am incredibly impressed that people were able to figure them out without the benefit of the second face. That second face is called Statistical Mechanics, which uses statistical principles to understand microscopic flows of energy--very pretty, but not at all practical until you tie it to the macroscopic principles. Schroeder's book seems to have a nice balance of the big and the small. Dan used to teach here, by the way, and I have a lot of respect for his insights, so I expect his book will have many other virtues other than its price.

I plan to have two exams, an irregular scattering of quizzes (on my model of classic problems), regular weekly homework, and a final exam. Your course grade will come from the following combination of your individual grades:

Grading:
The weight in determining your final grade will be:

Quizzes: 20%
Problem Sets: 15%
Exams: 20%
Final Exam: 25%

Tentative schedule:

 Date

 Chapter in Schroeder

 Jan. 26 - Feb. 2

Ch. 1

 Feb. 4 - 11

Ch. 2

 Feb. 14 - 21

Ch. 3

 Feb. 23 - 25

 Ch. 4

 Feb. 28 - Mar. 17

 Ch. 5

 Apr. 3 - 10

 Ch. 6

 Apr. 12 - 24

 Ch. 7

 May 1 - 5

 Ch. 8

 Wed., Mar. 8

 First Exam

 Fri., Apr. 28

 Second Exam

 May 19 (Monday)
9:00 am

 FINAL EXAM

 

Physics Faculty/Staff ~ Physics Courses ~ Physics Research ~ Physics Events ~ Physics Links ~
Back to the Physics Department Homepage ~ Visit the Grinnell College HomePage.
Page last updated on Jan 20, 2001.
Please contact the WebEditor with site-related questions.