Welcome to the Fall 2014 web page for PHYS561

Physics 561 Course Syllabus

Fall 2014 

Instructor: P. Phillips, Rm. 2121 ESB

 

Textbook: P. Phillips, Advanced Solid State Physics, 2nd Edition

Cambridge University Press, 2013

 

Phillips' Office Hours: Tuesday, 1:30-3:00pm

 

Teaching Assistant: Hasan Shapourian

 

 

A. Many-Body Methods

  1. Introduction: Spontaneous Symmetry Breaking
  2. Free-electron Gas
  3. Tight-binding
  4. Born-Oppenheimer Approximation
  5. 2nd Quantization and Field Operators
  6. Hartree States/Hartree-Fock Approximation/Koopman’s Theorem
  7. Interacting Electron Gas
  8. Beyond H.F./Wigner Interpolation

 

B. General Many-Body Phenomena

  1. Phenomenology on Local Magnetic Moments in Metals
  2. Green Functions
  3. Anderson Model
  4. Mean Field Solution Using Equations of Motion
  5. Relation to Kondo Model
  6. Kondo problem, scaling and all that
  7. Plasma Oscillations
  8. RPA
  9. Dielectric Response Function e(k,ω)
  10. Stopping Power of a Plasma
  11. Phonons and e−-phonon Interaction
  12. Ultrasonic Attenuation
  13. Electrical Conduction (Drude Formula,
    et al. . . . )
  14. Boltzmann Transport Equation, Hydrodynamic c Limit, Sound Propagation
  15. Bosonization of Electron Gas
  16. Luttinger liquids
  17. Fermi Liquid Theory, Luttinger's non-theorem

C. Superconductivity

  1. General Properties of Type I and Type II Superconductors
  2. London Equations
  3. Energy Gap, Penetation Depth, Ultrasonic Attenuation
  4. NMR (Hebel-Slichter Peak)
  5. BCS Model
    a. Phonon-induced Cooper Pair
    Formation
    b. Global Pair State
    c. Normal Ground State Instability        
    d. Gap Equation
    e. Quasi-particle Excitations
    f. Thermodynamics
    g. Nuclear Spin-lattice Relaxation

 

D. Localization and Quantum Hall physics

  1. Anderson Localization
  2. Weak Localization
  3. Integer Quantum Hall Effect
  4. Topological Insulators
  5. Fractional Quantum Hall Effect
  6. Quantum Phase Transitions 

E. Course Requirements

  1. Five Homework Sets (approximately)
  2. Take-home midterm
  3. Take-home Final

LECTURES AND HOMEWORK LINKS

 

Homework 1: All problems in chapters 2 and 3  (due Sept.  9, 2014).

 

Homework 2: Problems 4.1, 4.2, 5.1, 6.1,6.2, 6.5. (due Sept. 16, 2014).

 

Homework 3: Problems 7.2,7.3,7.5, 8.2,8.3. (due Oct. 7, 2014).

 

Miderm: In the book, do problems 6.3, 7.4, 8.4, 9.1, 9.3, 9.4, 9.6  (Please work independently.  If you need help getting started, stop by my office).  Due 10-29-2014

 

Homework 4:  Problems 11-1,  11-2, 12-7, 12-3:  (due Nov.  21)

 

Final exam: Problems in Text: 6.6,12.8,12.9, 13.1,13.3,13.5, 15.1, 15.2,

                                                   15.3, 16.3  (Due Dec. 20, 5:00pm. please turn into my                              office)