PHYS 487 :: Physics Illinois :: University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

Schedule

The reading assignments refer to chapters in Griffiths, Introduction to Quantum Mechanics, 3rd Ed. Exact lecture dates for the topics may shift as we go through the course. Computational assignments are found here.

Lecture notes for each week's lectures will be posted Wednesday or Thursday. They are provided as a help in looking back what was covered, not to replace reading, or taking your own notes during lecture. Use them at your own risk; they may contain typos.

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Discussion notes can be found here.

Week	Date	Lecture	Discussion	Homework	Reading
1	08/24	Review of Phys 486	No Discussion
1	08/26	Symmetries and Transformations in Quantum Mechanics	No Discussion		6.1, 6.2
2	08/31	Symmetries and conservation laws	Discussion 1 Solution	HW1 (due 9/8) solutions	6.3--6.5
2	09/02	Symmetries and conservation laws	Discussion 1 Solution	HW1 (due 9/8) solutions	6.6, 6.8
3	09/07	Labor Day	Discussion 2 Solution	HW2 (due 9/15) solutions	4.4.3
3	09/09	Addition of angular momentum	Discussion 2 Solution	HW2 (due 9/15) solutions	4.4.3
4	09/14	Addition of angular momentum	Discussion 3 Solution	HW3 (due 9/22) solutions	4.4.3
4	09/16	Time-independent perturbation theory I Clebsch-Gordon coefficients	Discussion 3 Solution	HW3 (due 9/22) solutions	7.1, 7.2
5	09/21	Time-independent perturbation theory II	Discussion 4 Solution	HW4 (due 9/29) solutions	7.1, 7.2
5	09/23	Degenerate perturbation theory	Discussion 4 Solution	HW4 (due 9/29) solutions	7.2
6	09/28	Degenerate perturbation theory	Discussion 5 Solution	Practice problems for MT 1 HW5 (due 10/13) solutions	7.3.1
6	09/30	Relativistic effects in the hydrogen atom	Discussion 5 Solution	Practice problems for MT 1 HW5 (due 10/13) solutions	7.3.1
7	10/05	Synthesis and review	(No discussion)
7	10/07	Midterm 1, solutions	(No discussion)		7.3.2
8	10/12	Spin-orbit coupling	Discussion 6 Solution	HW6 (due 10/20) solutions	7.4
8	10/14	no lecture	Discussion 6 Solution	HW6 (due 10/20) solutions
9	10/19	Zeeman effect (strong and weak)	Discussion 7 Solution	HW7 (due 10/27) solutions	8.1,8.2
9	10/21	Hyperfine splitting, the variational principle	Discussion 7 Solution	HW7 (due 10/27) solutions	8.3, 8.4
10	10/26	Time-dependent Hamiltonians	Discussion 8 Solution	HW8 (due 11/3) solutions	11.1
10	10/28	Time-dependent perturbation theory	Discussion 8 Solution	HW8 (due 11/3) solutions	11.1, 11.2
11	11/2	Emission and absortion of radiation	Discussion 9 Solution	HW 9 (due 11/17) solutions Practice problems for midterm II	11.2, 11.3
11	11/4	Spontaneous emission	Discussion 9 Solution		11.4
12	11/9	review	(No discussion)		11.5
12	11/11	Midterm 2, solutions	(No discussion)		11.5
13	11/16	Adiabatic approximation	Discussion 10 Solution	HW 10 (due 12/1) solutions	11.5
13	11/18	Adiabatic theorem	Discussion 10 Solution	HW 10 (due 12/1) solutions	4.5
14	11/24	Thanksgiving break
14	11/26	Thanksgiving break
15	11/30	Geometric phase, coupling to E&B fields	Discussion 11 Solution	HW 11 (due 12/9) solutions	4.5
15	12/02	Aharanov-Bohm and Landau levels	Discussion 11 Solution	HW 11 (due 12/9) solutions	5.3.1
16	12/07	Landau levels	Discussion 12	practice problems for the final	5.3.2
16	12/09	Bloch sphere and density matrices	Discussion 12	practice problems for the final	5.3.2
	12/10		Reading Day
	12/17	Final exam: 1:30-4:30 pm, Loomis 144