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Mechanics and thermodynamics

People

Montina A.

Course director

Description

This course presents the basic laws and concepts of classical mechanics. After an introduction of kinematics and the operational definitions of mass and force, we discuss the three laws of Newton and their consequences, such as conservation of momentum and energy in presence of conservative forces. Then, we deal with linear oscillations of coupled particles, central forces, constrained dynamics as well as rigid body dynamics. This will take us to the Lagrangian and Hamiltonian formalism. In the Hamiltonian formalism, we present Liouville's theorem, which has a fundamental role in statistical mechanics. After a presentation of continuum mechanics and fluidodynamics, which concludes the part on classical mechanics, we introduce the basic concepts of thermodynamics. The course requires a knownledge of mathematical analysis and linear algebra.

This course is open to Master students upon approval by the master director (6 ECTS).

 

REFERENCES

J. R. Taylor, Classical Mechanics, University Science Books (2005) / Daniel Kleppner, Robert J. Kolenkow, An Introduction to Mechanics, Cambridge University Press (2010).

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