Instructor: Mark Taylor
Office: Gerstacker 118
Phone: 569-5241
email: taylormp@hiram.edu
Office Hours:
MWF 4:15-6:00, T 1:00-4:00, Th 1:00-4:00, Sun. 3:00-6:00
Also feel free to stop by at other times, call me, or send me email
Physics Study Session:
Thurs. evenings 6:30-9:30 in Gerstacker 123
Meeting Times:
MWF 8:30-9:50; Colton 15
Textbook:
“Thermal Physics” by Daniel V. Schroeder
Course Overview:
Thermal or statistical physics provides the link between the microscopic world of atoms and molecules and the macroscopic world of everyday objects. This subject tackles such foundational issues as 1) the origin of irreversible processes from the time symmetric fundamental laws of physics and 2) the emergence of simple thermodynamic behavior in systems comprised of a large number of particles governed by an underlying chaotic dynamics. We will address these issues by examining the microscopic origins of the laws of thermodynamics. Since macroscopic systems are composed of an enormous number of particles, an exact description of each individual particle is impractical (if not impossible). Thus, we make use of probabilistic or statistical methods. While such an approach may appear to be approximate, in fact, statistical mechanics is a rigorous and exact theory of macroscopic matter. This course will cover the fundamentals of thermodynamics, statistical mechanics, and elementary transport theory. Since computer simulations play an important role in contemporary statistical mechanics research, we will also study the Monte Carlo method and everyone will carry out a computational project to investigate a magnetic, liquid, polymer, or other many-body system.
Links to pdf files:
Course Information | Syllabus | Maple_Notes | Monte Carlo Projects |
Problem Sets
Problem Set 01 | Problem Set 07 |
Problem Set 02 | Problem Set 08 |
Problem Set 03 | Problem Set 09 |
Problem Set 04 | Problem Set 10 |
Problem Set 05 | |
Problem Set 06 |
Other Items:
MatLab Code:
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Handouts: |
Software: |
binfill4.txt | Ideal Gas Thermo | StatMech for Windows |
modulo_rng.txt | MC_Simulations | StatMech for Mac (OSX) |
ising1.txt | MC_Uncertainty | |
ising2.txt | Transport Coefficients | |
ising_M.txt | Transfer Matrix for 1D Ising | |
ising_Cv.txt |