Physics 508 Statistical Mechanics
Spring Semester 2008

 
Note: Below is a preliminary list of topics that may change during the course of the semesters. "Chapters" refer to class notes rather than to the text.

Chapter 1: Fundamental Principles of Statistical Physics

  1. Review of topics in Classical Mechanics
    1. Hamilton's equations, phase space
    2. Phase flow
    3. Liouville's theorem
    4. Poincare's recurrence theorem
    5. Necessity of a statistical description of many-particle systems
  2. Statistical methods
    1. Probability
    2. Binomial distribution
    3. Poisson distributions
    4. Averages & fluctuations
    5. Continuous distributions
    6. Gaussian distribution and the central limit thereom
  3. Review of Thermodynamics
    1. Statistical description of large systems
    2. The equilibrium state
  4. Statistical ensembles
  5. Quantum statistical mechanics

Chapter 2: Selected Applications

  1. Classical Systems
  2. The ideal Fermi gas
  3. The ideal Bose gas
  4. Maxwell's velocity distribution

Chapter 3: Phase Transitions

  1. Phenomenology and classification of phase transitions
  2. An exactly solvable model: The 1D Ising model
  3. Renormalization group

Chapter 4: Kinetic Theory

Chapter 5: Numerical Simulations

Chapter 6: Topics in Non-Equilibrium Stat Mech (time permitting)


Text

The official text for the course is Equilibrium and Non-Equilibrium Statistical Thermodynamics by Le Bellac, Mortessagne and Batrouni.
 
  Other useful texts are Statistical Physics 3rd Edition Part 1, Course of Theoretical Physics Volume 5 by Landau and Lifshitz, and Fundamentals of Statistical and Thermal Physics by Reif.
 

Problem Assignments and Exam Dates


  Problem Assignment 1 due 02/05/08 ( PDF )
  Problem Assignment 2 due 02/12/08 ( PDF )
  Problem Assignment 3 due 02/19/08 ( PDF )
  Problem Assignment 4 due 02/26/08 ( PDF )
  Exam 1 March 6, 2008
  Problem Assignment 5 due 03/20/08 ( PDF )
  Problem Assignment 6 due 03/27/08 ( PDF )
  Problem Assignment 7 due 04/03/08 ( PDF ) *there may be an extension on this, given that we haven't yet covered this material.
  Exam 2 April 17, 2008
  Problem Assignment 8 due 04/24/08 ( PDF )
  Problem Assignment 9 due 05/01/08 ( PDF )
  Final Exam Wednesday, May 14, 2008 @ 1:30pm in Workman 310
 
  Homework due dates and exam dates are subject to change.
Problem Assignments 34%
Exam 1 22%
Exam 2 22%
Final Exam 22%