PHGN-350 Fall-2011

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Course Information

Instructor: P. David Flammer Office: MH447A Office Hours: TBA

Course Announcements and Links

1. 10/13/2011 - Since I fell behind slightly in the lectures, I haven't introduced the Hamiltonian stuff. If you read through section 7.10 in the book, the problems are honestly pretty easy (7.22 and 7.23). But if you don't feel comfortable doing them, you can turn in your homework on next Wednesday for full credit. Those people who turn it in tomorrow will get 10% extra credit.
2. 9/29/2011 - On second thought, I think I'm well enough for office hours. I'll hold them in the Physics library (MH335).
3. 9/29/2011 - I got super sick after lecture on Wednesday 9/28. So I won't make it to office hours unfortunately. Please email me with any questions you have, and I will try to respond to those as quickly as possible.
4. 9/29/2011 - Here are the solutions to the first practice test: media:pt1-pg1.jpg media:pt1-pg2.jpg media:pt1-pg3.jpg Note: On the solution to Number 1, I lost a minus sign on the last two lines of the solution. There should be an extra minus sign inside the square root in the answer.
5. 9/28/2011 - I said in class that the test covers Chapters 2,3, and 5. Anything covered in lecture and the section on rockets are also fair game on the test, so make sure you review all that material.
6. Due to the continuing growing pains of numerical programming, I will allow people to turn in their homeworks on Monday in class with no late penalty. To reward those students who turn it in on time, I will give you 10% extra credit on the homework if you turn it in in class today.
7. In email correspondence to me, please write PHGN350 in the subject line (exactly like that). It will help me respond to those emails faster.
8. Exam 1 will be in class on 9/30/2011. It will be a 1 hour test, but I will allow people to stay until 12:30 to finish it.
9. Exam 2 will be in class on 11/16/2011 (Note I had changed this briefly, but this is now on the original date). Again,it will be a 1 hour test, but I will allow people to stay until 12:30 to finish it.
10. Here's a nice Mathematica tutorial made by Zach Boerner: media:mathematicaHelp.nb

Course Material

Syllabus

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Homework

1. Problem set 1 due Friday, 9/2:
   1. Register your iclicker at http://iclicker.com/support/registeryourclicker/
   2. Send me (pflammer@mines.edu) an email with a picture of yourself, and a paragraph description of who you are. This will give me a hope of knowing who you are by the end of the semester.
   3. Do the following problems: Thornton 2.6, 2.8, 2.13, 2.14, 2.15, 2.22; Solutions: media:350-fa11-HW1Soln.pdf
2. Problem set 2 due Friday 9/9:
   1. Solve the following analytical problems: Thornton 2.25 (except part (d)), 2.28, 2.42; Solutions: media:350-fa11-HW2Soln.pdf
   2. Do the following numerical problem: media:350-fa11-NHW1.pdf; Solution: media:350-fa11-NHW1Soln.pdf
      1. Some guidance: We would like you to discretize the integral equations in order to solve this. For instance, a_y=a_y(y,v_y). You know y_0 and v_y0. If you break the problem up into very small time steps dt's, then at time dt v_y(dt)=v_y0+a_y(y_0,v_y0)*dt. Then y(dt)=y_0+v_y0*dt+1/2*a_y(y_0,v_y0)*dt^2. If your dt is small enough, you can even neglect the last term. To get the next time step, you do the same thing again. v_y(2*dt)=v_y(dt)+a_y(y(dt),v_y(dt)) and y(2*dt)=y(dt)+v_y(dt)*dt+1/2*a_y(y(dt),v_y(dt))*dt^2. To get it the stuff at 3*dt, you repeat. Put this into a Do loop or a For loop, and you can do this out to infinity and beyond (not really).
3. Problem set 3 due Friday 9/16:
   1. Do the following problems: Thornton 3.1, 3.2, 3.7, 3.11, 3.13, 3.14; Solutions: media:350-fa11-HW3Soln.pdf
4. Problem set 4 due Friday 9/23:
   1. Solve the following analytical problems: Thornton 3.18, 3.28, 3.38
   2. Do the following numerical problem: media:350-fa11 NHW2.pdf
      1. Note: Use the same shooting method as above.
      2. Note 2: Read through the whole thing before you start programming! I would use the solution from NHW1 as a guide of how to program it. If you do the plots and the module the way it's done there, this will go pretty fast.
      3. Note 3: We are still ignoring a few facts in this assignment. Mars of course has weather due to the fact that it is spinning. Go ahead and assume that the speed of the wind everywhere with respect to the inertial reference system is zero. This is of course probably not the right thing to do, but let's take one step at a time.
5. Problem set 5 due Friday 9/30 (the day of the test):
   1. Do the following analytical problems: Thornton 5.3, 5.7, 5.10, 5.14 (build it in spherical shells)
6. Problem set 6 due Friday 10/7/2011:
   1. Do the following analytical problems: Thornton 6.3, 6.7, 6.12
      1. Hints: On 6.7, don't try to constrain the motion of the light. Just try to figure out the full path of the light moving from the starting point to the final point taking into account that the speed is c/n (c=speed of light in space and n is the index of refraction). you will end up getting that the n*sin(th)=constant so it moves in a straight line if n=const and if n changes theta must change so that n1*sin(th1)=n2*sin(th2).
7. Problem set 7 due Friday 10/14/2011:
   1. Do the following analytical problems: Thornton 7.6, 7.7, 7.10 (solve for position as a function of time for (a), and set up differential equations of motion for (b)), 7.14, 7.15, 7.22, 7.23.

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Lecture Notes

These downloads require Adobe Acrobat Reader 8/24-Lecture 1 8/26-Lecture 2 8/29-Lecture 3 (in y(t) at bottom middle: exp(-kt) should be (1-exp(-kt)) 8/31-Lecture 4 9/2-Lecture 5 9/5-Lecture 6 9/7-Lecture 7 9/9-Lecture 8 9/12-Lecture 9 9/14-Lecture 10 9/16-Lecture 11 9/19-Lecture 12 9/21-Lecture 13 9/23-Lecture 14 9/26-Lecture 15 9/28-Lecture 16: Practice Test 9/30-Lecture 17: Test 10/3-Lecture 18 10/5-Lecture 19 10/7-Lecture 20 10/10-Lecture 21 10/12-Lecture 22