Text books

The following are the recommended and supplied text books by Madras University.

1. Quantum Mechanics, V.K. Thankappan, New Age International Publishers.
2. Classical Mechanics, S.N. Biswas, Books and Allied (P) Ltd.
3. Mathematical Physics, P.K. Chattopadhyay, New Age International Publishers.
4. Introduction to Integrated Electronics (Digital and Analog),   V. Vijayendran, S. Vishwanathan (Printers & Publishers) Pvt. Ltd.
5. Statistical Mechanics, B.K. Agarwal and M. Eisner, New Age International Publishers.
6. Introduction to Electrodynamics, David J. Griffiths, Pearson Prentice Hall.
7. Fundamentals of Molecular Spectroscopy, Colin N. Banwell and Elaine M. McCash, McGraw Hill

These are for the courses in the first year. The University buys these books in bulk and supplies to all the students! The fees collected includes the cost of the books.

I think, this is a bad idea. Not that I have anything against these authors (yet!), though I have a lot against a lot of these publishers! Poor quality printing to start with!

I think, the students should be allowed to buy any book they want. Anyway, the books are there, so let us get on with it.

Intro

I run too many blogs for my own good. Anyway, this is to teach physics to my wife, and hopefully her classmates. I have persuaded her to take up M.Sc Physics in Madras University – through correspondence. The text books have arrived.

I have decided to add some notes, explanations etc. and also help her solve standard text book problems. The idea is to revisit the blog whenever she has doubts and needs clarifications. Further, it may also help her classmates. Let us see how this progresses.

Since she studied B.Sc Physics several years back, to refresh her memory, I have started teaching her select chapters from Resnick and Halliday. We have completed the chapters on Mechanics and have just started on Thermodynamics.

Advantage of using WordPress is, it allows embedding equations via LaTeX – like this:

See you!