This web site exists to allow students to download notes, and to provide some useful or interesting links. The working syllabus for this subject is provided in hard copy on enrolment. It also has text book references for the different sections. Assessment and other details for this subject are listed in the first year student guide. First Year Physics: The First Year Physics home page, with links to Student Enquiries, Courses and Administration Exam timetable First Year Courses and Syllabi The first half of this course (weeks 1-7) is taught by Prof John Storey. Contents Lecture notes Tutorials Course links Past tests Other useful links Miscellany News For the section of the syllabus taught by Joe (introduction to quantum physics), there will be no formula sheet. Complicated formulae, such as the expression for the Fermi distribution, will be provided if needed in individual questions. There is an on-line survey on Vista. In last year's class, students said that they wanted 'more feedback'. We'd like to know what this means. More voluntary feedback (tutorial problems, past papers)? More assessment? More quizzes? More tests? More lab exercises? (Results of the survey conducted 24/10/05.) This is our new mutlimedia site on mechanics. It's under construction but currently has displacement-time problems, projectiles, circular and simple harmonic motion, and centre of mass. If you use this, please tell us what you think. Latest Physics News from the American Institute of Physics includes nanometre (nearly TeraHertz) ultrasound and a non-spherical observable universe. A silicon-based quantum cellular automata cell has been developed by the Centre for Quantum Computing Technology. (M. Mitic et al, Applied Phys. Letters, 89, 013503 (2006). It uses four quantum dots, controlled by gates and has single electron transistors for readout. Figure from the paper showing circuit and SEM pictures of the structure. Also powerpoint anmation (Caution: 7 Meg). Courtesy Prof Andrew Dzurak. Some tips on studying physics, just in case you need them.

• Download Joe's lecture notes for PHYS1221-1231, part 1, in .pdf format
• Download Joe's lecture notes for PHYS1221-1231, part 2, in .pdf format
• Download Joe's lecture notes for PHYS1221-1231, part 3, in .pdf format
• Download all of Joe's lecture notes for PHYS1221-1231, in one single document (300k)
• Download more notes on the Bohr-de Broglie-Sommerfield model, in .pdf format
• Download Acrobat Reader if you are having problems reading the downloaded notes.

Tutorials

• Solutions to Tutorial 8, 1221
• Solutions to Tutorial 9, 1221
• Solutions to Tutorial 10, 1221

• Solutions to Tutorial 8, 1231
• Solutions to Tutorial 9, 1231
• Solutions to Tutorial 10, 1231

• Prof John Storey writes: "Q7, Tutorial 8 is an interesting one. If the orbit is sufficiently tight (eg two neutron stars orbiting each other) and their orbital periods can be measured with sufficient accuracy (eg, if those neutron stars are also pulsars - which fortunately many neutron stars are), the orbital decay due to gravitational radiation is detectable. Hulse and Taylor won the Nobel prize for this in 1993 - you might direct the students to the corridor display.

  This is an area in which Australian astronomers are also working. I suspect there is a second Nobel prize in this, as the increasingly accurate measurements (and the longer time over which these and similar objects have now been measured) allow exquisite tests of GR.

  John is talking about two neutron stars very close together. What is it for the Earth going round the sun (as asked in the problem)? I asked eminent cosmologist, Prof John Webb of UNSW who responded, quick as a flash, that the proportional rate of decay in the period due to gravitational radiation is, under general relativity, (12/5)G³m³/c⁵a⁴ for a symmetric pair, where a is the semi-major axis of the orbit. Applying this to the earth-sun dipole (complicated by asymmetry, but this would give a factor of order unity), this gives about 10^-43 s^-1. So for the earth, this is vastly inferior to tidal effects and even to the light pressure of the sun's radiation. (The last mentioned effect acts in the opposite direction.)

• Young's experiments with electrons and photons. A recent, single-electron version of the Young's experiment for electrons, carried out by Hitachi. The original Youn'gs experiment with electrons were reported by
  C Jönsson 1961 Zeitschrift für Physik 161 454-474
  C Jönsson 1974 Electron diffraction at multiple slits American Journal of Physics 42 4-11.
  In class, we looked at the results of a Young's experiment with individual photos. Alain Aspect's "Dualité onde-corpuscule pour un photon unique"
• A page on the Planck scale from our site on special relativity.
• An unusual introduction to Heisenberg's uncertainty principle
• Images of and from a Scanning Tunnelling Electron Microscope, courtesy of Prof. Michelle Simmons. Micro$oft alert: 3 Mbyte.
• The quantum mechanics of cricket
• Physics animations from the University of Syracuse
• Hydrogen atom orbitals, courtesy of Paul Falsted
• Download Joe's notes about fundamental forces, in .pdf format (Note that this is not in the syllabus)
• Discussion of aspects of black body radiation and thermal radiation.
• The electromagnetic spectrum: wavelengths, frequencies, temperatures, entropy and information.
• Web notes about beats and standing waves from our own site
• Web notes about standing waves in the vocal tract, including helium speech from our own site
• Web notes about the decibel scale from our own site
• Just in case you need to revise some high school physics.

• American Institute of Physics story about anti-hydrogen.
• A link about fire walking and thermal conductivity. (NB Archived copy: original page missing).

• Tips on doing physics tests.

• Download the equation sheet for the old version of this subject, in .pdf format.
  
• Download PHYS1231 2004 end-of-session test for the old version of this subject, in .pdf format.
  
• Download sketch of answers to the PHYS1231 2004 end-of-session test for the old version of this subject, in .pdf format.
  
• Download PHYS1221 2004 end-of-session test for the old version of this subject, in .pdf format.
  
• Download sketch of answers to the PHYS1221 2004 end-of-session test for the old version of this subject, in .pdf format.
  
• Download 2003 end-of-session test for the old version of this subject, in .pdf format.
  
• Download sketch of answers to the 2003 end-of-session test for the old version of this subject, in .pdf format.
  
• Download 2002 end-of-session test for the old version of this subject, in .pdf format.
  
• Download sketch of answers to the 2002 end-of-session test for the old version of this subject, in .pdf format.
  
• Download 2001 end-of-session test for the old version of this subject, in .pdf format.
  
• Download sketch of answers to the 2001 end-of-session test for the old version of this subject, in .pdf format.
  
• Download 2000 end-of-session test for the old version of this subject, in .pdf format.
  
• Download sketch of answers to the 2000 end-of-session test for the old version of this subject, in .pdf format.
  
• First year page with other past papers and tutorial solutions (courtesy of Richard Newbury, Ranji Balalla and Robert Stening)

Other useful links

• The Physics Classroom by Tom Henderson. This excellent web site is aimed at high school level, so it only covers a portion of our syllabus, but it may be useful for revision. Highly recommended.
• The Physics Hypertextbook by Glenn Elert. It has good sections on waves, and on other sections of the 1231 syllabus. It is still under construction, however, and most sections are rather incomplete.
• Physics 2000 is a site provided by the University of Colorado. It has a section about the Bohr atom and some areas of quantum physics, and some on relativity. It is aimed at high school students, but is a fun read.
• An article on Black body radiation contributed by G. Pattison, a high school student. Well explained and with good graphics.
• A little discussion of the exchange of virtual particles.
• Applets for reflections of waves at various boundaries. You get to chose most of the relevant parameters. Worth while visiting!
• Movies of various types of travelling and standing waves from Dan Russell at Kettering University. Highly recommended!
• Physics World (on line journal)
• Scientific American (on line journal)
• National Institute of Science and Technology of the USA. Great resource on units and the SI system.
• Web resources in physics provided by the Australian Institute of Physics
• Plotting and fitting data A good graphing progam with error weighted fitting, written by UNSW student Michael Johnston
• The particle adventure provided by the Contemporary Physics Education Project
• A diagram showing the relations among the units in SI, in .pdf format
• A list of Joe's educational sites.

Miscellany

• Students with disabilities who would like special arrangements are invited to contact the lecturers (John Storey and Joe Wolfe) directly.
• Learning for life is an interesting set of resources that answers many of the questions and personal problems that students have with university life.

  

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Extra reference material: an equation you need for question E1 on the 1231 tut 10. Photo courtesy Prof Dennis Isbister, ADFA, UNSW.



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Physical optics

Here are a couple of photographs (courtesy Ra Inta) taken using the diffraction grating and polaroid (respectively) from your Physical Optics Kits.

   

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Happy birthday, theory of relativity! In June 2005, relativity was 100 years old. Our contribution is Einstein Light: relativity in 10 minutes... or 10 hours. It explains the key ideas in a short multimedia presentation, which is supported by links to broader and deeper explanations.