PHYSICS 505   -  Mechanics

Autumn 2009

 

Time and day: 9:30-10:20   MWF

Room: A114

 

Instructor: Prof. Stephen D. Ellis

Office: B401 (PAB)

Telephone: 5-2396

Email: sdellis@u.washington.edu

Office Hours:  Tu 4-5:30 PM

 

TA: Kamil Michnicki

Office: B427
Telephone: 3-3904

Email: kpm3@u.washington.edu

 

 

To send email to everyone in the class use  - phys505a_au09@u.washington.edu

 

You may find it informative and entertaining to watch the 1964 Messenger Lectures by Richard Feynman now available on the web courtesy of Microsoft (some of the material is relevant to this course)

 

http://research.microsoft.com/apps/tools/tuva/index.html

 

 

Texts: 1) Theoretical Mechanics of Particles and Continua, by Alexander L. Fetter and John Dirk Walecka (Dover reprint series); 2) Chaotic Dynamics: An Introduction, by Gregory L. Baker, J. P. Gollub (Cambridge University Press; 2 edition, 1996).


         Comments:  These texts together will allow us to cover (“rapidly”) the usual topics of classical mechanics (see the syllabus) and an introduction to chaotic behavior.  (The good news is that both books are available in paperback at reasonable prices.)  To help you handle the quantity of matter I will provide lecture notes in class and on the web.  While some of the material will be familiar, we will want to focus on topics you likely have not seen in the typical undergraduate course.  As part of your preparation for the rest of your graduate studies, we will make solving nontrivial physics problems (i.e., the homework and the exams) a high priority.  Note that covering classical mechanics in 10 weeks will be a challenge for all of us.  A list of reference texts (including more standard graduate level course texts) is provided here.  We will follow a schedule similar to the class taught last year by Steve Sharpe (and at a more rapid pass than when I last taught this course in 2005)

 

 

A tentative Syllabus can be found here.

 

The proposed general Exam/Homework schedule is here.

 

Handout I (with the above material) is here

 

 

Lecture notes for Autumn 2009

 

Lecture 1 (9/30/09, 10/2/09) Introduction and Review: Newton’s Laws, Conserved Quantities and Systems of N Particles
           If you want a quick overview of Group Theory, try my lecture notes from Phys. 557
          
Lecture 5 - Introduction to Group Theory

Lecture 2 (10/5/09, 10/7/09) Central Forces and Scattering 
           Mma
Notebook for studying 1/r potential
           “Canned” animations showing a
variety of central potentials, “comet” moving around the sun, i.e.,

           similar to my notebook.

           Here are some Animations -

           Scattering in an attractive 1/r potential               Scattering in a repulsive 1/r potential

 

 

 

 

 

          

 

 

 

           Orbit in 1/r potential                                               Orbit in HO potential

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lecture 3 (10/9/09) Inertial Reference Frames

Lecture 4 (10/9/09, 10/12/09) Non-Inertial Reference Frames

           Lecture 4 Appendix—Ex. 2.6 in F&W, second order expansion (in w) of motion near the surface of the earth.

Lecture 5 (10/14/09, 10/16/09) The Methods of Lagrange I 

           Mathematica notebook for Calculus of Variations and Lagrange

Lecture 6 (10/19/09, 10/21/09) More on Coordinate Transformations and Constraints – Lagrange II

           Mathematica notebook for 2 sample problems

Lecture 7 (10/23/09) The Methods of Lagrange III – Symmetries and Hamiltonians

Lecture 7 Appendix (10/26/09) Examples of Flows in Phase Space
Lecture 8 (10/28/09) Small Oscillations
          
Mathematica notebook for coupled pendula problem

Lecture 9 (10/30/09, 11/2/09) Small Oscillation in Large N Systems
Lecture 10 (11/4/09) Rigid Body Motion
Lecture 11 () Hamilton and Hamilton-Jacobi Techniques

 

HW Assignments – You are encouraged to use Mathematica whenever it will be helpful with the HW, and Learn to use it in your other work.  Information on using Mathematica at the UW can be found here and also in the Primer.  You may also find it useful to look at the Microsoft supplied Hands-on Intro, which is best viewed while running the demo within Mathematica.

 

HW I (10/07/09)  (25 pts), Solutions
HW II (10/14/09)  (25 pts), Solutions
HW III (10/21/09)  (25 pts), Solutions
HW IV (10/28/09)  (25 pts), Solutions
HW V (11/4/09)  (25 pts), Solutions
HW VI (Due 11/13/09, 11/11/09 is a Holiday!!)  (25 pts)

MidTerm Exam (11/6/09) Solutions, Results

 

 

 

Materials from the last time I taught Physics 505 in 2005

HW Assignments

HW I (10/5/2005)  (25 pts)

HW II (10/12/05)  (25 pts)

HW III  (10/19/05)  (25 pts)
HW IV (10/26/05)  (25 pts)
HW V (11/2/05)  (20 pts)
HW VI (1/9/05) (35 pts)
HW VII (11/18/05)  (23 pts)
HW VIII (11/23/05)  (18 pts)
HW VIII
Appendix (11/30/05)  (Notes on Numerical Methods) (6 pts)
HW IX (11/30/005)  (21 pts)
HW X  (12/9/05) (19 pts)

 

Lecture notes from Autumn 2005

 

Lecture 1 (9/28/05, 9/30/05) Introduction and Review: Newton’s Laws, Conserved Quantities and Systems of N Particles
           If you want a quick overview of Group Theory, try my lecture notes from Phys. 557
          
Lecture 5 - Introduction to Group Theory

Lecture 2 (10/3/05, 10/5/05, 10/7/05) Central Forces and Scattering 

Lecture 3 (10/10/05) Inertial Reference Frames

Lecture 4 (10/12/05) Non-Inertial Reference Frames

Lecture 5 (10/14/05, 10/17/05, 10/19/05) The Methods of Lagrange I 

Lecture 6 (10/21/05, 10/24/05) More on Coordinate Transformations and Constraints – Lagrange II

Lecture 7 (10/26/05, 10/28/05, 10/30/05) The Methods of Lagrange III – Symmetries and Hamiltonians

Lecture 7 Appendix (10/31/05) Examples of Flows in Phase Space
Lecture 8 (11/4/05, 11/7/05, 11/9/05) Small Oscillations
Lecture 9 (11/9/05, 11/14/05) Small Oscillation in Large N Systems
Lecture 10 (11/16/05, 11/18/2005) Rigid Body Motion
Lecture 11 (11/21/05) Hamilton and Hamilton-Jacobi Techniques
Lecture 12 (11/23/05, 11/28/05) Anharmonic Motion
Lecture 13 (11/28/05, 11/30/05) Damped, Driven and Nonlinear Oscillators
                                 (Associated Mathematica File: 
Mma Notebook, PDF file)
Lecture 14 (12/2/05, 12/05/05) Flows in Phase Space II (Appendix A, Appendix B)
Lecture 15 (12/05, 12/07/05) Introduction to Chaotic Motion
Lecture 16 (12/09/05) More about Chaos