Physics 209

Fall 2002

University of California, Berkeley

Instructor: Robert Littlejohn

Office: 449 Birge

Office Hours: MWF 12-1

Telephone: 642-1229

Email: physics209@wigner.berkeley.edu

Lecture: 308 LeConte

Time: MWF 11-12

Discussion Section: Thursdays, 5:00-6:30pm, 329 LeConte

TA: Alfredo Correa, alfredo@wigner.berkeley.edu

Office Hours: Tu 2-3

Office: 277 LeConte

Text: Classical Electrodynamics by J. D. Jackson

Prerequisites

The prerequisites for the course are a one-semester undergraduate course in Electricity and Magnetism
(preferably a two-semester course) at the level of Griffiths, Introduction to Electrodyamics or Lorraine,
Corson and Lorraine, Fundamentals of Electromagnetic Phenomena.

Grade, Exams

The grade will be based on homework, the midterm Exam, and the final Exam (40% homework, 15%
midterm, and 45% final).

The final exam will he held on Wednesday, December 11, 12:30-3:30pm, in 150 GSPP (Goldman
School of Public Policy).

Midterm Solutions in pdf format only.
Histogram of Midterm Scores
Final Solutions in pdf format only
Histogram of Final Scores

Homework Policy

Homework will be posted on this web site normally by Saturday of each week. The first homework
will be due on Saturday, September 7 at 5:00pm. All subsequent homeworks will be due on Friday
at 5:00pm.   Homeworks should be placed in the box labelled Physics 209 on the second floor of
LeConte, just before the breezeway going over to Birge.   Late homeworks will be accepted at 50%
credit up to one week late. Homeworks more than one week late will not be accepted.   Exception:
each student is allowed one free late homework (up to one week late), no questions asked.

Course Outline

Review of electrostatics and magnetostatics
Special Relativity
Radiation
Scattering
Diffraction
Special Topics

Homework Assignments

0. Read Chapters 1 and 2 of Jackson by Saturday, August 31. There is nothing to be turned in this week.

1. Homework in postscript or pdf format, due Saturday, September 7.

2. Homework in postscript or pdf format, due Friday, September 13 at 5:00pm.

3. Homework in postscript or pdf format, due Friday, September 20 at 5:00 pm.

4. Homework in postscript or pdf format, due Friday, September 27 at 5:00 pm.

5. Homework in postscript or pdf format, due Friday, October 4 at 5:00pm.

6. Homework in postscript or pdf format, due Friday, October 11 at 5:00pm.

7. Homework in postscript or pdf format, due Friday, October 18 at 5:00pm.

8. Homework in postscript or pdf format, due Friday, October 25 at 5:00pm.

9. Homework in postscript or pdf format, due Saturday, November 2 at 5:00pm.

10. Homework in postscript or pdf format., due Friday, November 8 at 5:00pm.

11. Homework in postscript or pdf format, due Friday, November 22 at 5:00pm.

12. Homework in postscript or pdf format, due Friday, November 22 at 5:00pm.

13. Homework in postscript or pdf format, due Friday, December 6 at 5:00pm.

Homework Solutions

Homework solutions are available in pdf format only.

Solutions to Homework #1.
Solutions to Homework #2.
Solutions to Homework #3.
Solutions to Homework #4.
Solutions to Homework #5.
Solutions to Homework #6.
Solutions to Homework #7.
Solutions to Homework #8.
Solutions to Homework #9.
Solutions to Homework #10.
Solutions to Homework #11.
Solutions to Homework #12

Notes

1. Notes on Green's Functions in postscript or pdf format.

2. Notes on SI and Gaussian Units in postscript or pdf format.

3. Notes on the Levi-Civita Symbol in postscript or pdf format.

4. Notes on Tensor Analyis in postscript or pdf format.

5. Notes on Thomas Precession in postscript or pdf format.

Lecture Notes are Professor Littlejohn's hand-written notes for lectures. They are not available for all
lectures, and no guarantees are made about how accurately they reflect the actual lectures. Go to the
lecture notes web page.

Optional Notes are not required reading, they are just for your edification if you are interested. The first set is
taken from an earlier Physics 221A course. They concern the theory of rotations, which explains things like the
deeper theory underlying multipole expansions, how to get Y_lm's with raising and lowering operators, how to
derive the addition theorem for spherical harmonics, the meaning of irreducible tensors,and many other things.
Much of this is standard fare in 221A, and you may find these notes useful also for that course.

1. Notes on Rotations in 3D Space and Classical Mechanics, in postscript or pdf format.

2. Notes on Rotations of Spin 1/2 Systems, in postscript or pdf format.

3. Notes on Representations of Rotations in postscript or pdf format.

4. Notes on Orbital Angular Momentum and Spherical Harmonics in postscript or pdf format.

5. Notes on Coupling of Angular Momenta in postscript or pdf format.

6. Notes on Irreducible Tensor Operators in postscript or pdf format.

The notes on spins in magnetic fields explain g-factors and such things.
The notes on the Stark effect explain how molecular polarizabilities are computed in quantum mechanics. The
notes on the hyperfine structure explain the use of the Fermi contact term for the magnetic field of a particle.
The notes on the Electromagnetic Field Hamiltonian contain a discussion of Coulomb gauge and transverse and
longitudinal vector fields. The notes on the Lorentz covariance of the Dirac equation contains a discussion of
the Lie algebra of the Lorentz group.

7. Notes on Spins in Magnetic Fields in postscript or pdf format.

8. Notes on the Stark Effect in postscript or pdf format.

9. Notes on Hyperfine Structure in postscript or pdf format.

10. Notes on the Electromagnetic Field Hamiltonian in postscriptor pdf format.

11. Notes on the Lorentz Covariance of the Dirac Equation in postscript or pdf format.

The notes on action-at-a-distance electrodynamics tell the interesting story of the Feynman-Wheeler theory.

12. The Feynman-Wheeler theory, in pdf format only (taken from Jagdish Mehra, The Beat of a Different

Drum (Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1994))..