Math for Physicical Science

Instructor:

Peng Zhou, pzhou.math@gmail.com

Office Hours at 931 Evans Hall

  • Monday 11:30am-12:30noon, 4:30pm - 5:30pm
  • Thursday 2-3pm.

Grading: Homeworks: 20% + Quizzes 10% + Midterms 30% + Final 40%

Textbook: Boas “Mathematical Methods in the Physical Sciences” 3rd. ed

Homeworks are due Tuesday in class.

Quizzes will be announced in the previous class. It is not taken regularly every week.

Syllabus


Midterm 1: Oct 8th

Midterm 2: Nov 7th

Final: December 18th, 8-11am


Week 1:

Lec 1 (9/3): Convergence of Sequences and Series. Test of convergences.

Lec 2 (9/5): Exercises for Lec 1. Power series and series expansion of functions.

Homework 1 (due on 9/10 in class) (...and small correction: problem 3, sum starts from n=2, not n=1)

Solution 1



Week 2:

Lec 3(9/10): Finishing Ch 2. More about Taylor expansion. Start Ch2

Lec 4(9/12): Quiz 1. Section 2.5, 2.6, 2.7

Homework 2: (Solution)

S1.13: #20,#22,#27,#33

S1.15, #6, #7, #19 #23.

S2.5: #5, #55, #62

S2.6 #8, #9(note, this is not absolute convergence. compare with example 2 above), #12, #13

S2.7 #3, #7, #12, #13, #16

S2.17 #13(hint: compare the real part and imaginary part from both sides), #16


Week 3:

Lecture 5(9/17): Review the quiz. Complex powers and roots. Sine, Cosine and exponentials.

Read Ch 2.11-13, do

Lecture 6(9/19): Quiz 2 on Ch 2. Start Ch 14. Cauchy-Riemann condition.

Homework 3

Ch 2: sec 9: #4, #6, #16, #18

sec 10: #15,#26

sec 11: #6, #13, #17

sec 12: #2, #3, #26, #28

sec 14: #1,2,3

Ch 14:

sec 1: #1, #3, #6, #7, #9, #13, #14

sec 2: #22, #23

[Solution]


Week 4:

Lecture 7(9/24): Review quiz 2. Finish 14.2

Lecture 8(9/26): singularity of analytic function; multi-valued function; examples of contour integral.

HW4: [Solution (thanks to Angelica)]

14.2 #34, #35, #36

6.8 #1,#2, #3

14.3 #1,2,4,5,7,8,12,15


Week 5:

HW5 (due on Oct 15)

14.3: #21,# 23,

14.4: #3, 5, 7, 9, 11

14.6: #5, 6, 9, 14, 16, 18, 24, 30, 31

[HW5 Solution] (correction: I wrote solution for 10(d) instead of 11(d). For 11(d), one get order 3 pole).


Midterm 1. Oct 8 (Tuesday in class)

[Practice problems] and solution

typos in problem #5: it should be changed to 1/(z+1) + 1/(z+2).


Week 6

[Midterm 1] [Solution]

score distribution


Week 7:

  • Leture 10/17. about chapter 14.7 Note

HW 6:

(A) section 14.7 #3, #12, #14, #22

(B) In addition, if your midterm grade is <= 50, I would suggest you to work out corrections of the midterm.

Solution to HW6


Week 8:

Lecture note this week on Ch8. We covered up to 8.8. Skipped 8.4

HW7:

8.3 #1, #2, #11

8.5 #3, #11

8.6 #1, #2, #3

8.8 #1, #2, #8

HW 7 Solution

Exposition: (there is no correct answer)

  1. Summarize in your own word, how to solve a first order linear differential equation, of the form y' + A(x) y = B(x).
  2. How to solve a second order constant coefficient homogeneous equation? How about the inhomogeneous one?
  3. How many free parameters does the general solution of a third order differential equation have? Why?
  4. What is Laplace transform? Why do you think it is useful in solving equations?



[Week 9]

Lecture note

Solution to HW6 posted

HW 8: Due next Thursday.

  • 8.9, #3
  • 8.10, #8, #14
  • 8.11, #7, #15
  • 8.12 #1, #2, #3

HW8 Solution


[Week 10]

Solution to HW7 posted.

Office hour this week: Monday 11:30 - 1:30pm. Tuesday 2-3pm.

11.5 Tuesday: Review and Examples.

11.7 Thursday: Midterm 2. and its solution , score distribution

No homework this week.

HW8 Solution posted


[Week 11]

HW9(Due Nov 21, Thursday):

7.5 #2 7.8 #11(a),(b) 7.11 #10 7.12 #9 7.13 #21

Fourier Transform lecture notes


[Week 12]

HW10, Due Thursday(12/5)

9.1 #2

9.2 #4, #5

9.3 #2, #6

9.5 #8, #11

[HW 10 Solution]


[Week 13]

Office Hours this week:

(12/3) Tuesday: 2-4pm

(12/5) Thursday: 2-3pm


Final in previous years and Sample problems

2015 Sample Final, and solution

Previous exams: https://math.berkeley.edu/courses/archives/exams/math-121a. These exams may overlap, but not entirely coincide with our course materials, so you can use at your own discretion.

About Final:

Series and Sequence(10), Contour integral (20), Differential equation (e.g. chapter 8) (20) Green function(10) Fourier Transform(20), Variational Methods(20)

Formula that will be provided in case it is needed in the problem: Taylor expansion table (as in midterm 1), Laplace transformation table (as in midterm 2), the Gaussian Integral of exp(-x^2/2), Convolution formulae for Fourier and Laplace transformation.