Today's quiz and solution ...

can be found here.

Hints on HW 1

Here you go [PDF], hints on 6, 8, and 10. Given that we did 2 others in class already ... you should be good to go.

We'll also go over what MeV means in recitation tomorrow. I forgot to mention that this is a unit of energy commonly used when talking about particles and stuff, my bad. It is covered in the Serway book. Basically, the 'eV' part means 'electron volt', and the 'M' and 'G' are metric prefixes for one million (10^6) and one billion (10^9), respectively. 1eV = 1.6 x 10^-19 Joules.

This means 1MeV = 10^6 eV = one million electron volts = 1.6 x 10^-13 Joules, and 1GeV = one billion joules = 1.6 x 10^-10 J.

Basically, when you see 'eV' that is just an alternate unit of energy, nothing more. The rest energy of a proton is 939MeV, which is useful for one of the problems ...

Applet for 30 Aug 2007

In addition to a few follow-up questions, we will be using this online 'applet' to demonstrate some relativistic effects.

The procedure and questions will be available at class time.

Relativity Exercises / Homework

Relativity is tough stuff, and the course will get easier after this (I think, YMMV). In particular, the last exercise today was tough. Getting a better handle on relativity will require a little patience and practice.

If you had trouble with the exercises today:

• we will go over them in detail in Thursday's class
• I am available most of tomorrow if you need help - send me an email
• we will do some homework problems in Friday's recitation

Finally, here are a couple of links that might help you: one, two. The first is a bit more general and helpful, I think.

Printed Course Notes Available

Printed and bound copies of the course notes are now available at the SUPe store, on the shelves.

The notes packets are $37.85, or about 15 cents per page for 251 pages. Keep in mind that nearly all the figures are in color, so they are giving you a good price on these. It is a tough price to beat if you want to print them up on your own ... the library wants 25 cents per page, for example.

Again, they are not required, but I do recommend them. From next week on, starting with electrostatics, I think they will be a big help. You can still view them online if you'd rather not buy them.

Physics Help Desk Hours

The hours for the physics help desk are now posted. They may change slightly in the next week or two, as the GTA's schedules may still change.

Find them here [link on page], or here [directly to pdf].

Note that all of the help center hours are in the afternoon/evening.

Tomorrow's Exercises (28 Aug 07)

Below is a link for tomorrow's exercise:

Relativity Exercises [pdf]

You don't need to print these out ahead of time if you don't want to. Once the lecture portion is finished, you will break up in to groups to work on these exercises, and you can print them at that time.

Of course, I'm not stopping you from reading them ahead of time, but it is not necessary.

"Lab" for tomorrow

We will not have any proper lab "experiments" this week while we study relativity. Rather, we will work on in-class exercises and problem solving during the second half of class tomorrow and Thursday.

So, for tomorrow, all you need to do is glance through Ch. 26 a bit, and be ready to solve problems in groups. Nothing to print out or bring to class this time. There will be work due at the end of class, however ...

This is a temporary thing, just while we finish relativity. Proper labs will begin next week when we start with electrostatics.