Dr. Aniruddha Chakraborty

Course Details:                                                                              <<back

Energy is at the heart of science and yet no course exists specifically to explain it, and in simple terms.
Using only a very minimum amount of mathematics, this course will explain the modern concept of energy, in all its known forms: Hamilton's mechanics and how it shaped twentieth-century physics, and the meaning of kinetic energy, potential energy, temperature, action, and entropy. Many fascinating questions will be covered in this course, including:

- Why just kinetic and potential energies - is one more fundamental than the other?
- What are heat, temperature and action?
- What is the Hamiltonian?
- What have engines to do with physics?
- Why S=k ln W works?

Course Outline:

Naive conceptions of energy.

Energy as the cause of things.

Definitions of energy.

Energy and work.

Conservation of energy.

Kinetic Energy (K.E.).

Potential Energy (P.E.).

Internal Energy: K.E. and P.E. mingled.

Different Forms of Energy.

Energy as substance - can it be stored?

Work and Kinetic Energy.

Suggested Books:

 1. Introductory Quantum Mechanics, R. L. Liboff (4th edition) Addison-Wesley (2002).

 2. Modern Quantum Chemistry, Attila Szabo, Dover (2000).

 3. Molecular Spectroscopy, Jeanne L. McHale, Prentice Hall (1998). 

Further Reading:

Watts, D. Michael (1983). Some alternative views of energy. Physics Education, 18 (5), 213-217.

Warren, J. W. (1983). Energy and its carriers: A critical analysis. Physics Education, 18 (5), 209-212.

Sherwood, Bruce Arne (1983). Pseudowork and real work. American Journal of Physics, 51 (7), 597-602.

Lehrman, Robert L. (1973). Energy is not the ability to do work. The Physics Teacher, 11 (1), 15-18.

Ellse, Mark (1988). Transferring not transforming energy. School Science Review, 69 (24), 427-437.

Bernard, W. H. (1984). Internal work: A misinterpretation. American Journal of Physics, 52 (3),253-254.

Duit, Reinders (1987). Should energy be illustrated as something quasi-material? International Journal of Science Education, 9 (2), 139-145.