Essays in Physics
Thirty-two thoughtful essays on topics in undergraduate-level physics
1st Edition
Published on 16. July 2021
480 pages
978-0-19-259934-6 (ISBN)
Description
Each of this book's 32 essays discusses a chosen topic, at a level that is generally within that of a four-year degree course in Physics. The essays supplement (indeed sometimes correct) treatments usually given, or supplies reasoning that tends to fall through the cracks. The author uses his life long experience of tutorial teaching at Oxford to know what topics often need such discussion, for clarification, or for avoidance of common confusions. The book contains accounts of even-standard topics, accounts that offer an unusual emphasis, or a fresh insight, or more than customary rigour, or a cross-link to apparently unrelated material.
The student (and their teachers) who really wants to understand physics will find this book indispensable. Often the outcome of tutorial discussion has been an understanding that lies a little to the side of what is presented in standard texts. Such understanding is presented here in the essays. The topics covered are diverse and have something useful to say across most areas of a physics degree.
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Geoffrey Brooker
Essays in Physics
Thirty-two thoughtful essays on topics in undergraduate-level physics
Book
07/2021
Oxford University Press
€98.40
Shipment within 15-20 days
Geoffrey Brooker
Essays in Physics
Thirty-two thoughtful essays on topics in undergraduate-level physics
Book
07/2021
Oxford University Press
€48.00
Shipment within 15-20 days
Person
Geoffrey Brooker joined Wadham College Oxford as a Fellow by Special Election in 1969, becoming Fellow and Tutor in Physics and University Lecturer in Physics from 1970 to 2003, when he was awarded the title of Emeritus Fellow.
Content
- 1: Electromagnetic energy
- 2: Electromagnetism: microscopic and macroscopic fields
- 3: Vector theorems
- 4: Longitudinal and transverse waves
- 5: Transmission lines, the universe and everything
- 6: Counting quantum states and field modes
- 7: Four-vectors in relativity
- 8: The Lorentz transformation
- 9: Diffraction integrals and the Kirchhoff approximation
- 10: Diffraction at a slit
- 11: Symmetry in quantum mechanics
- 12: Successive approximation; perturbation theory in quantum mechanics
- 13: The hydrogen atom
- 14: Identical particles and the helium atom
- 15: Helium: energies for singlets and triplets
- 16: LS coupling; Hund's rules
- 17: Terms in LS coupling
- 18: The Zeeman effect
- 19: The Einstein A and B coefficients
- 20: The Boltzmann distribution and molecular gases
- 21: Free energy
- 22: Energy of a magnetic body: -m dB or +B dm?
- 23: The Debye theory of solid-state heat capacities
- 24: Umklapp collisions and thermal conductivity
- 25: Electrons and holes in semiconductors
- 26: The chemical potential for a semiconductor
- 27: Heat capacity of electrons
- 28: Electrons in a square lattice
- 29: Negative feedback
- 30: Stability of negative feedback
- 30: Quantization of waves: the stretched string
- 32: Spontaneous emission of radiation
