CLASSICAL PHYSICS FOR ENGINEERS

SHORT COURSE OF

CLASSICAL PHYSICS

FOR ENGINEERS

Erik Bodegom

Portland State University

Dan A. Iordache

University "Politehnica" Bucharest

Ireneusz Strzalkowski

Warsaw University of Technology

Preliminary Version 0.5!

FOREWORD

Physics - as a humankind "engine"

It is well-known the outstanding role of Physics in the development of all natural sciences, of the technical sciences, inclusively.

As it concerns its own structure, the Physics operation is somewhat similar to an engine with 2 pistons. The experimental research leads to the discovery of new phenomena and empiric laws, whose interpretation imposes some theoretical hypotheses, named theoretical laws or principles. Because these theoretical laws were obtained by incomplete induction (they were rather "guessed"), the ensemble of Physics principles is not equivalent to the corresponding experimental findings that generated these principles.

For this reason, the thorough study of the Physics principles' consequences (the field of Theoretical Physics) leads frequently to predictions of some pro 11211w2220l cesses that were not at all assumed and studied previously (this is the case of the Special and General Relativity theory, of the nuclear energy, lasers, etc). In such a manner, Theoretical Physics has also an essential role for the general development of Physics, as it can be found also from the examination of Table 2 of this book Introduction (referring to the analysis of the main topics of the research works awarded by Physics Nobel prizes).

That is why the attempts to eliminate one of the 2 above indicated types of Physics knowledge [as it was the more than one century old attempt of Ernst Mach to eliminate the outstanding Statistical Physics theory (and its underlying atomism ideas) of Ludwig Boltzmann] can have only bad consequences for the general Physics development, and for the Physics education of specialists.

We have to underline also: a) the strong connection of the main 2 Physics methods, pointed out also by the strong preoccupation of some Theoretical Physics institutions [as the Abdus Salam International Center for Theoretical Physics (ICTP) from Trieste, Italy] for direct applications in many experimental fields, e.g.: Physics of Condensed Matter, Physics and Energy, Physics and Technology, Earth and Environmental Sciences, Space Physics, Physics of the Living State, Topics at the Interface with Chemistry, Engineering, Biology, Instrumentation for Nuclear and Sub-nuclear physics [2], b) the importance of both main Physics methods in engineering, the first one for the new qualitative knowledge about the physical phenomena and their technical applications, and the second one for its possibilities to contribute to the design of different technical devices, inclusively.

Present concerns about the Physics teaching in the technical Universities

In the last years, there is a general concern to improve the quality and the efficiency of the academic education, from the technical Universities, especially.

From the numerous studies accomplished by some specialized organizations, as: a) the European Society for Engineering Education (Société Européenne pour la Formation des Ingénieurs, SEFI, involving more than 250 top European Universities), b) Conference of European Schools for Advanced Engineering Education and Research (CESAER, involving other more than 50 European Universities of prestige), we will mention here the synthesis work [3]. The requirements indicated by this synthesis [volume C (in frame of E4 Thematic Engineering Education in Europe)], for the Physics discipline corresponding to the Bachelor Level (3 years) (pages 57, 58, of the above indicated work) are:

Physics. The graduate should be able to:

(i)          use the relevant laws of kinematics and dynamics to solve problems of rotational and lateral movement,

(ii)        explain harmonic oscillations, damped oscillations and forced oscillations and treat such oscillations mathematically,

(iii)       describe waves mathematically and explain the concept of wave lore,

(iv)      explain the first and the second law of thermodynamics and solve problems applying these laws,

(v)        explain the principles of electric and magnetic fields and apply the basic laws of electric circuits,

(vi)      explain the basic principles of quantum theory.

The accomplished study (E. Bodegom, D. Iordache "Physics teaching in technical Universities and the Physics evolution in the last century", see also table 2 of the first chapter "Introduction" of this textbook) pointed out that the main topics of all awarded (1901-2005) Physics Nobel prizes (PNP, reflecting the main results of Physics in the last century) can be grouped as it follows:

a)          topics recognized as important for technical applications by practically all engineers: Thermodynamics (2 awarded PNP) and Electromagnetism & electromagnetic waves (5 awarded PNP) = totally 7 PNP (all awarded up to 1919), representing approximately 6.36% from the 110 main Physics topics corresponding to the awarded Physics Nobel prizes,

b)          important Physics topics for the understanding of the work of practically all modern technical devices: Optics (11 awarded PNP), Quantum Physics (8 PNP), Condensed Matter Physics (19 PNP) = totally 38 PNP (awarded between 1902 and 2005), representing about 34.5% from the 110 main Physics topics corresponding to awarded PNP,

c)          important Physics topics for the understanding of the work of the modern devices specific to certain technical specialties: Spectroscopy (9 PNP), Atomic and Molecular Physics (11 PNP), Nuclear Physics (10 PNP), Plasma Physics (2 PNP) = totally 32 PNP (awarded between 1902 and 2001), representing about 29.1% of all main Physics topics awarded with PNP,

d)          important Physics topics for future, but that are not presently used in technical applications: Elementary Particles & Fundamental Interactions (27 PNP), Astrophysics and Cosmology (6 PNP) = totally 33 PNP, representing 30% of all main PNP topics.

It results that the above requirements of the specialty organizations SEFI and CESAER, that will be adopted as basic Curriculum of this textbook, represent mainly the most important Physics results obtained in the 18^th and 19^th centuries, i.e. the Classical Physics, however with up to date interpretation and reference to the new achievements of physics.

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We have to underline also that - as it concerns the opinions of different technical Universities leaderships relative to the usefulness of the Physics elements teaching in the undergraduate cycle - it seems that there are now 3 main opinions:

(i)          the necessity to ensure unique Physics textbooks for scientists and engineers (involving the topics on Elementary particles & Fundamental interactions, Astrophysics and Cosmology): specific mainly to the American [4] and UK Universities, etc.

(ii)        the necessity to ensure the teaching in the undergraduate cycle of the Physics knowledge corresponding to the topics of the above a) and b) items, and - depending on the specific technical specialty - also of some notions belonging to the above item c) technical academic education feature in France, Italy, Czech Republic, Hungary, Israel, etc.

(iii)       the restriction of the taught Physics elements in the undergraduate cycle only to the elements belonging to the above item a), with very few additional elements concerning the basic principles of the Quantum Physics: opinion of above indicated European organizations, etc.

We consider as useful that the undergraduate students of technical faculties continue their Physics study by means of (at least optional, or facultative) course "Elements of Modern Physics", involving (at least) the Optics, the Quantum Physics and the Condensed Matter Physics.

The Objectives of this book

For moment, the main target of this textbook are the Romanian technical faculties remained with only 1 Physics teaching semester after the reform from 2005 of the Bachelor cycle. Of course, this textbook can be used also for the first part "Classical Physics" of the usual Physics courses from the technical Universities.

Besides the above indicated requirements of the European specialty organizations (SEFI and CESAER), we have to pay attention also to the rather numerous studies concerning the didactic technology. So, many recent studies (e.g. [6]-[8]) stress the necessity to: a) minimize the cognitive load by limiting the amount of material presented, b) have a clear organizational structure of the presentation, c) link new material to ideas that the audience knows, d) avoid unfamiliar technical terminology, e) point out frequently the applications of the taught notions in the work of usual systems, f) use the new educational technology: clickers, peer instruction technique (e.g. [9]), etc.

In order to accomplish the students training for the Physics individual study and application activities, the present textbook will try to ensure:

1) a scientific and didactic documentation up to day (the main results from 2005, inclusively), involving the modern possibilities of information obtainment by means of search systems (as Google, Wikipedia, etc), now usually accessible to our readers (students, engineers, professors, etc),

2) synthesized information (by means of some tables, preferably), aiming to transmit to students the maximum updated information in a minimum volume (number of pages),

3) the lectures have to ensure the presentation of only basic notions, avoiding: a) too intricate derivations, b) detailed discussions of the presented information (sometimes synthesized by tables),

4) the "weight-center" of this Short Course should be the directed to Applications, namely the solved problems and exercises, that will undertake the main difficulty of the studied discipline, so that the largest part of students effort be done for the: a) applications understanding, b) independent accomplishment of some similar applications,

5) the most difficult (even solved) problems will be indicated by 2 asterisks (**); we would like that these problems be solved and discussed together with the Physics professors,

6) the fulfillment of the above indicated requirements (a . f) of didactic technology.

This course wants to help the students and even the Physics professors in their professional preparation. Obviously, this course cannot solve the specific problems of each students series, the choice of some particular Physics elements and their adaptation to the true possibilities of each students group remaining a task of Physics professors.

Structure of the elaborated textbook

The authors adopted the structure of the American Physics textbooks from the last years (see e.g. [10]), involving Physics knowledge at the usual level of: a) high-schools, b) Bachelor cycle from technical Universities, c) graduate (Master) studies.

As it concerns the proportions of the different knowledge levels, they were chosen as (approximately): a) 25% knowledge at the high-school level, b) 50% knowledge at the usual Bachelor cycle in the technical Universities, c) 25% for somewhat more advanced knowledge (involving some modern Mathematics elements, or qualitative elements referring to the scientific results from the last years), corresponding to the usual Master level.

In order to help the readers recognize easily the knowledge level, a certain number of asterisks were used in frame of indices of each textbook paragraph and problem, i.e.:

a)      no asterisk signs (e.g.: §1.2 or problem 1.6.4) indicate the high-school level,

b)      one asterisk sign (e.g.: §1.6* or problem 1.6.1*) indicate the usual Bachelor cycle level,

c)      2 asterisk signs (e.g.: §1.7** or problem 1.7.2**) indicate the advanced level, corresponding to the best students, and/or to the Master studies.

The solved problems corresponding to the high-school level were chosen from the edition 1988 of the Romanian Physics textbooks (referred in following as RPT88, published by the Didactic Printing House, Bucharest), taking into account that in this year the Romanian students obtained their best result at the International Physics Olympiads (first place in the non-official classification on countries, according to the results established by the Austrian jury) [11].

Acknowledgments. The authors thank very much to Professors Miroslav Dolozilek (Technical University from Brno, Czech Republic), Veturia Chiroiu (Institute for Solid Mechanics of the Romanian Academy), Elena Cristina Lacatus [Fac. of Engng. & Management of Technol. Systems, Univ. "Politehnica" Bucharest (UPB)] and Vladimir Balan (Mathematics Dept., UPB), Luminosu Ioan (Univ. "Politehnica" Timisoara), Andrei Petrescu (Physics General Inspector of Romanian high-schools), as well as to teaching Assistant Florin Pop (Dept. Computer Sciences, UPB) for their very important and useful observations and suggestions.

One of authors (D.I.) expresses his best thanks to the leadership of "Politehnica" University from Bucharest (to Prof. Ecaterina Andronescu and to Prof. Gheorghe Marian, especially), for the awarded grant that allowed his participation to the elaboration of this academic course.

THE AUTHORS

References

Franck Wilczek "Total Relativity: March 2004" (Physics Today, April 2004).

https://www.ictp.trieste.it/www_users/ItaLab/

Günter Heitmann, Aris Avdelas and Oddvin Arne "Innovative Curricula in Engineering Education", Firenze University Press, 2003.

Erik Bodegom, J. C. Straton "Physics - the Forgotten Subject for the Non-Physics Majors", in Proc. of ICUPE ("The Changing Role of Physics Departments in Modern Universities"), E. F. Redish, J. S. Rigden, eds., pp.755-757, 1996.

Eva Hradilova "Position of Physics within the Structured Study Programs at faculty of Electrical Engineering and Communications of the Brno University of Technology", Proceedings of the International Conference "Physics teaching in Engineering education" (PTEE-2005), Brno, Czech Republic, July 2005.

C. Wieman , K. Perkins "Transforming Physics Education", Physics Today, 58(11) 36-41, November 2005.

D. J. Grayson "Rethinking the Content of Physics Courses", Physics Today, 59(2) 31-36, February 2006.

J. Hehn, M. Neuschatz "Physics for All? A Million and Counting!", Physics Today, 59(2) 37-43, February 2006.

E. Mazur "Peer Instruction: A User's Manual", Prentice Hall, Upper Saddle River, NJ, 1997.

J. Bernstein, P. M. Fishbane, S. Gasiorowicz "Modern Physics", Prentice Hall, Upper Saddle River, NJ, 2000.

a) W. Gorzkowski, edit. "International Physics Olympiads", vol. 1, 1990, World Sci. Publ. Comp., Singapore; b) W. Gorzkowski, edit. "International Physics Competitions: International Physics Olympiads and First Step to Nobel Prize in Physics", Instytut Fizyki PAN, Warszawa.

SHORT CURRICULUM VITAE OF THE AUTHORS

Dr. ir. Erik Bodegom completed his engineering degree at Technical University Delft (Netherlands) and his PhD (1982) at Catholic University of America in Washington, DC. Since 1985 he is with Portland State University, where he is Professor and Chair of the Department of Physics. His pedagogical activities have included the writing of set of astronomical exercises, the development of resistance probe for use in schools, and the development of software to remotely control observatories.

He served as President of the Oregon Academy of Science. His research activities have ranged from ultrasonic studies, low temperature physics to statistical mechanics and solid state physics.

Prof. Bodegom participated to scientific research activities in frame of laboratories of Delft University of Technology (Netherlands), Vitreous State Laboratory at Catholic University of America, Washington DC (USA), École Supérieure d'Électricité, Gif sur Yvette (France), etc, being the author of 2 US patents.

His main scientific works were published in Phys. Rev., J. Appl. Phys., Rev. Phys. Appl., J. Chem. Phys., Physica, Eur. J. Phys., Cryogenics, Adv. Cryog. Eng., Rev. Sci. Instr., Nucl. Instr. & Methods in Phys. Res., Proc. SPIE, J. Stat. Phys., etc, as well as in the Proceedings of many international scientific Conferences.

Dr. phys. Dan-Alexandru Iordache accomplished his Physics studies at the University of Bucharest (Romania) and his PhD (1971) at the same University. Since 1963 he is with the University "Politehnica" from Bucharest, where he is Professor of the Physics Department. His didactic activities involved the elaboration of some Physics textbooks and Collections of Physics solved problems (150 published didactic works).

His scientific research activities (more than 170 published scientific works) referred mainly to the Condensed Matter Physics field, Infrared Spectroscopy, the applications of the Numerical Physics, etc. He participated to many international scientific research projects, in frame of the International Center for Theoretical Physics, Trieste, Italy (1994-2000), of the Copernicus program (1995-1998), of Istituto Nazionale per Fisica della Materia (Genova), of NATO projects (2000-2001), etc., in frame of some scientific cooperations with Dipartimento di Fisica, Politecnico di Torino, of the Physics Department of Portland State University (US), etc.

Since 1992 he is vice-president of the section "Physics and Education" of the Romanian Physics Society, and from 2001 he is the representative of the European Physical Society (EPS) President for the Physics education in the Romanian Universities.

Dr. hab. Ireneusz Strzalkowski is graduated from Warsaw University, Master degree (1962). He completed in Warsaw University of Technology (WUT) his PhD (1969) and the Habilitation in solid state physics (1988). Since 1962 he is with WUT, where he is Professor of Department of Physics (from 1992), being Vice-Director for Education of the Inst. of Physics WUT (1981-1991).

His didactic activities included the elaboration of some physics textbooks, articles published in educational journals (in Polish) and works presented at national and international conferences. He is co-author edited currently Multimedia Academic Textbook "Physics", Vol.1 Notion and Heat, Vol.2 Fields and Particles (in Polish). He was Chairmen of the Committee on Physics Education of the Polish Physical Society (1995-97), President of the Polish Physical Society (1997-2002), member of the EPS council (1994-2003), member of the EPS Physics Education Division Board (since 2001) and of SEFI Working Group on Physics (since 1994).

His research activities (more than 80 published scientific works) concern the solid state physics, his main works being published in J. Appl. Phys., Appl. Phys. Lett., Thin Solid Films, Sol. St. Comm., Vacuum and in Proceedings of many international conferences. In 1973-74 he was given Senior Research Fulbright Award (USC, Los Angeles). He is also "Chartered Physicist" and "Fellow of Institute of Physics, UK" (since 1998), and since 1996 he is member of Committee of Physics Polish Academy of Sciences (and since 2003 member of Committee's Presidium).