Instructor
Dmitry Pushin
dmitry.pushin@uwaterloo.ca [1]
Office hours: Tentatively Mondays 2:30 pm - 4 pm (Toronto time)
Evaluation
Assessment | Weight |
---|---|
Homework | 30% |
Midterm | 30% |
Final | 40% |
Homework: every 2 weeks (roughly).
Course Topics
- Thermodynamics: Thermal equilibrium, the laws of thermodynamics.
- Probability Theory: Probability densities; central limit theorem; laws of large numbers.
- Kinetic Theory: Phase space densities; Liouville's theorem; the Boltzmann equation.
- Classical Statistical Mechanics: Microcanonical, canonical and grand canonical ensembles.
- Interacting Systems: Virial and cluster expansions; van der Waals theory.
- Quantum Statistical Mechanics: Quantization effects in molecular gases; phonons, photons; density matrix formulation.
- Identical Particles
Course Resources
Texts
- M. Kardar, Statistical Physics of Particles.
- K. Huang, Statistical Mechanics.
- L.D. Landau & E.M. Lifshitz, Statistical Physics.
Piazza [2]
This term we will be using Piazza [2] for class discussion. The system is highly catered to getting you help fast and efficiently from classmates and myself. Rather than emailing questions to the teaching staff, I encourage you to post your questions on Piazza. If you have any problems or feedback for the developers, email team@piazza.com.