PHYSICS 115A: STATISTICAL PHYSICS

Fall 2013

Instructor: Prof. Clare Yu
Office: 210E RH
Phone: 949-824-6216
E-mail: cyu@uci.edu
Office Hours: 3:00 - 4:00 pm Monday

Grader: Po-Chun Yeh
E-mail: pochuny1@uci.edu
Office: 132 RH

Lecture: 9:30-10:50 am Tu-Th, RH 188
Discussion Section : 1:00-1:50 pm Fri, ELH 110

Required Text: Fundamentals of Statistical and Thermal Physics, by F. Rief, published by Waveland Press.

URL for this course: http://eiffel.ps.uci.edu/cyu/p115A/ class.html

Lecture notes, syllabus, assignments, etc. will be posted at this URL.

Assignments : There will be homework assignments, due weekly. The homework assignments will be due at the beginning of class. Late homework that is turned in within 24 hours of the deadline will be given half credit. No homework will be accepted after that.

Mathematica : If you want to, you may use Mathematica to do homework assignments. But Mathematica is not required.

Discussion Problems: To improve your understanding of the material, you may be given a problem to work on in discussion section. The problem will be due by the end of the discussion section. The problem will be given a grade of 0, 1, or 2. Your lowest discussion score of the quarter will be dropped.

Grading : 10% discussion problem, 25% homework, 30% midterm, 35% final exam.

You scores will be posted on https://eee.uci.edu

Exams: The Midterm exam will be given in class on Tuesday, November 5 (closed book, no notes, no calculators). The 2-hour Final exam will be given on Thursday Dec. 12 from 8:00 am - 10:00 am. The Final will be comprehensive.

Recommended Texts:

Cheating and Academic Dishonesty: Anyone caught cheating on an exam or in any other aspect of the course will automatically fail the course. In addition, the appropriate deans will be notified. Cheating includes giving or receiving assistance on an exam. More generally, anyone involved in academic dishonesty will automatically fail the course. Academic dishonesty includes, but is not limited to, copying or providing answers on exams, use of unauthorized notes or other materials on exams, altering graded problems or exams before requesting regrading, obtaining unauthorized copies of problems or exams, lying to excuse an absence, or any other form of dishonesty or cheating intended to unfairly improve your grade. If you have any doubt about whether some behavior constitutes academic dishonesty, first, assume it does, and then ask the instructor to be sure. Please see the University's official policy at http://www.editor.uci.edu/catalogue/appx/appx.2.htm for more details. If you become aware of cheating, please contact the professor as soon as possible, and we will follow-up while ensuring your anonymity.

Course Outline:

  1. Introduction
  2. Probability (chapter 1)
    1. Binomial distribution
    2. Moments
    3. Gaussian distribution
  3. Basic concepts
    4. (chapter 2)
    1. States of a system
    2. Ensemble
    3. Basic postulates
  4. Statistical thermodynamics (chapters 2 and 3)
    1. Thermal and mechanical interactions between macroscopic systems
    2. Quasi-static processes
    3. Definitions: work, heat, temperature, entropy
    4. Laws of thermodynamics
    5. Reversible and irreversible processes
    6. Equilibrium conditions
  5. Macroscopic parameters (Chapter 4)
    1. Work and internal energy
    2. Heat
    3. Absolute temperature
    4. Specific heat
    5. Entropy
    6. Extensive and intensive parameters
  6. Thermodynamics (Chapter 5)
    1. Ideal Gases
    2. Maxwell relations
    3. Heat engines and refrigerators
  7. Basic methods of statistical mechanics (chapter 6)
    1. microcanonical ensemble
    2. canonical ensemble
    3. grand canonical ensemble
  8. Simple applications (chapter 7)
    1. Paramagnetism of spin 1/2 particles
    2. Harmonic oscillator; Classical equipartition theorem
    3. Ideal gas
    4. Specific heat of solids
  9. Quantum statistics (chapter 9)
    1. Symmetry considerations
    2. Maxwell-Boltzmann statistics
    3. Bose-Einstein statistics
    4. Fermi-Dirac statistics
  10. Applications of quantum statistics (chapter 9)
    1. Ideal gas - classical limit
    2. Degenerate Fermi gas: electrons in metals and white dwarf stars
    3. Black body radiation
    4. Bose-Einstein condensation
  11. Systems of interacting particles (chapter 10)
    1. Debye specific heat of solids
    2. Ferromagnetism