PC 242

Modern Physics

Failure of classical physics and early quantum theory, blackbody radiation and Planck’s theory, the photoelectric effect and light quanta, wave particle duality, Compton scattering, De Broglie and matter waves, Davisson and Germer experiment, energy quantization, Bohr’s theory of hydrogen, topics in atomic theory and the periodic table, X-ray spectra, molecules, phenomenological description of solids, Fermi statistics, conduction, semiconductors, energy bands. Nuclear physics, radioactivity, and modern particle physics, accelerators. Relativity. Prerequisites: PC131, PC132, (or PC141, PC142), MA205.