Ph 136b,c: APPLICATIONS OF CLASSICAL PHYSICS

Academic Year 2006-2007, Winter and Spring Terms

Instructor:

Kip Thorne. 154 W. Bridge Annex X4598. Email: kip@tapir.caltech.edu
Office hours: Mondays, 5:00 PM in the Theoretical Astrophysics Interaction Room, room 124 Bridge Annex.

Administrative Assistants to Kip and to tapir:
For course and tapir issues: Shirley Hampton. 151 Bridge Annex. X4597. Email: shirley@tapir.caltech.edu
To make appointments with Kip: JoAnn Boyd. 161 West Bridge. X4280. Email: joann@tapir.caltech.edu

Teaching Assistants for Third Term:

Marcus Teague. 59 Sloan, mlteague@caltech.edu. Office hours: Tuesday, 5:00PM - 6:00PM in 59 Sloan
Possibly: Matthew Stevenson. 053 Robinson, mas@astro.caltech.edu, mailcode 105-24. (Grading homework but not holding office hours).

Outline

The second and third terms will continue to follow the notes by Roger Blandford and me [Kip], as the core text of the class. You can find the notes online here. In the fall term Michael Cross taught the course and covered the first nine chapters, studying (broadly speaking) relativity, statistical physics, and optics. In the winter term I shall cover the next nine chapters (10 through 18), studying elasticity, fluid mechanics and magneothydrodynamics. In the spring term I shall cover the final nine chapters (19 through 27), studying plasma physics and general relativity & cosmology.

The course description for the first term will be found here, and for the second and third terms, here. You can also read the preface to the text to learn more about the philosophy of the course and the topics to be covered.

Handouts

Assignments and Exams

Solutions

These are solution sets prepared mainly by TAs over several years. They are meant to give suggestions about how the problems might be attacked, and should not be regarded as giving the only, or even the best, solution.

Last update December 6, 2006