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Syllabus

The topics I intend to cover this semester, with approximately one week alloted per topic, are:

• The basics of relativity
• Consequences of relativity
• Waves as particles and particles as waves
• Atoms and the Bohr model
• The Schroedinger equation
• Wave packets and the uncertainty principle
• Barriers and wells
• Angular momentum and the hydrogen atom
• Many particles
• Complex atoms and molecules
• Statistical physics
• Decays, radiation from atoms, and lasers
• Conductors, semiconductors, and superconductors
• The atomic nucleus

I also hope to cover some of the following special topics, scattered throughout the semester, as time permits:

• Chaos
• Elementary particle physics
• Cosmology
• String theory
• Granular materials