| HPS 2523 | History of Quantum Mechanics | Fall 2012 |
Back to course documents.
Schedule
| Week | Date | Subject | Warm up ex. due |
Presenter |
| 1 | Aug 30 | Introductory Survey (notes) | Norton (40 min) |
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| 2 | Sep 6 | Bohr-Sommerfeld Quantization Main reading: Silberstein, Ludwig Report on the Quantum Theory of Spectra. London: Adam Hilger, 1920. Notes Then, if you have time and interest, look at Niels Bohr, "On the Constitution of Atoms and Molecules," Philosophical Magazine, 26(1913), pp. 1-25. Sommerfeld, Arnold "Zur Theorie der Balmerschen Serie," Siztungsberischte der Bayerischen Akademie der Wissenschaften,Mathematische-Physikalische Klasse, 1915, pp. 425-58. Sommerfeld, Arnold, "Zur Quantentheorie der Spektrallinien," Annalen der Physik, 51(1916), pp. 1-94, 125-167. |
I II |
Norton (40 min) |
| Sep 6 | The adiabatic hypothesis Main reading: P. Ehrenfest, "Adiabatic Invariants and the Theory of Quanta." See also the longer version with proofs. P. Ehrenfest, "On adiabatic changes of a system in connection with the quantum theory," in: KNAW, Proceedings, 19 I, 1917, Amsterdam, 1917, pp. 576-597. Notes: Adiabatic hypothesis, Proof |
Norton (40 min) |
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| 3 | Sep 13 | Einstein's A and B coefficient analysis of radiation: Einstein, Albert "On the Quantum Theory of Radiation." Van der Waerden, Paper 1. Notes: black body radiation law, A and B coefficients paper |
III | Norton (40 min) |
| Sep 13 | Bohr's original correspondence principle Alisa Bokulich , "Bohr's Correspondence Principle", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. The principle is contained in Bohr, Niels "On the Quantum Theory of Line Spectra" Van der Waerden, Paper 3. (See pp.130-131) For background, see Sommerfeld, Atomic Structure and Spectral Lines. Appendix, Section 10, p.577+ |
IV | Michael Miller (60 min) |
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| Sep 13 | Norton, Applying the Correspondence Principle to transitions of a harmonic oscillator. | Michael Miller or Norton (20 min) |
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| 4 | Sep 20 | The Anomoalous Zeeman Effect and Spin H. A. Lorentz, "Theory of the Zeeman Effect," Ch 6 in Hindmarsh, Atomic Spectra. See also pp. 64 -66 for background. Notes |
V | Norton (30 min) |
| Sep 20 | S. Tomonaga, The Story of Spin. Ch 1-2. Background: A. Landé, "Term Structure and Zeeman Effect in Mulitplets," Ch. 7 in Hindmarsh, Atomic Spectra. |
Marina Baldissera Pacchetti (45 min) |
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| Sep 20 | G. E. Uhlenbeck and S. A. Goudsmit, "Spinning Electrons and the Structure of Spectra," Ch. 11 in Hindmarsh, Atomic Spectra. See also for background: G. E. Uhlenbeck and S. A. Goudsmit, "Ersetzung der Hypothese vom unmechanischen Zwang durch eine Forderung bezglich des inneren Verhaltens jedes einzelnen Elektrons," Die Naturwissenschaften," 13(47) (1925) 953–954. Notes |
Marina Baldissera Pacchetti (30 min) |
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| 5 | Sep 27 | Compton Scattering Arthur Compton, "A Quantum Theory of the Scattering of X-Rays by Light Elements," Physical Review, 21(5) (1923), pp. 483 – 502. Notes |
Tom Pashby (40 min) |
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| Sep 27 | BKS: the Bohr, Kramers, Slater Proposal Bohr, Kramers, Slater, "The Quantum Theory of Radiation," Van der Waerden, Ch. 5. Martin Klein, "The First Phase of the Bohr-Einstein Dialogue," Historical Studies in the Physical Sciences, 2 (1970), pp. 1-39. |
VI | Nora Boyd (90 Min) |
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| 6 | Oct 4 | Heisenberg's "Umdeutung" Discussion: Aitchison, Ian J. R., MacManus, David A., Snyder, Thomas M ."Understanding Heisenberg’s ‘magical’ paper of July 1925: a new look at the calculational details" : American Journal of Physics. 72, (2004) pp. 1370-79. Preprint quant-ph/0404009v1 |
VII | |
| Oct 4 | Part 1 | James Simkins (40 min) |
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| Oct 4 | Part 2 | Bihui Li (40 min) | ||
| Oct 4 | Part 3. | Marina Baldissera Pacchetti (40 min) | ||
| 7 | Oct 11 | Anthony Duncan and Michel Janssen, "On the Verge of Umdeutung: John Van Vleck and the Correspondence Principle." Preprint. Part One; Part Two. Published: Archive for History of Exact Sciences 61 (2007): 553–624, 625–671. | VIII | Jeff Sykora, Part 1 (45 min) Bihui Li, Part 2 (45 min) |
| 8 | Oct 18 | H. A. Kramers and W. Heisenberg, "On the Dispersion of Radiation by Atoms." Paper 10 in van der Waerden, Sources of Quantum Mechanics. A second look at Heisenberg's "Umdeutung." From Tony Duncan. Notes and "A translation dictionary: from 'On the verge...' to Kramers-Heisenberg" Documents arising in discussion: The "Berlin Talk"; The modern scattering calculation. |
IX | Anthony ("Tony") Duncan |
| 9 | Oct 25 | Born, M. and Jordan, P. "On Quantum Mechanics." Van der Waerden, Paper 13. The last section of the paper has been omitted from Van der Waerden's volume. It is available here. |
X | Michael Miller (60 min) |
| Oct 25 | Born, M., Heisenberg, W. and Jordan, P. "On Quantum Mechanic IIs." Van der Waerden, Paper 15. ...just a quick skim to see what has been added since the Born-Jordan paper. |
Bihui Li (30 min) | ||
| 10 | Nov 1 | P. A. M. Dirac, "The Fundamental Equations of Quantum Mechanics," (1925), Van der Waerden, Paper 14. Optional reading for the zealous insomniac: P. A. M. Dirac, "Quantum Mechanics and a Preliminary Investigation of the Hydrogen Atom," (1926) Van der Waerden, Paper 17. |
XI, XII | Tom Pashby (45 min) |
| Nov 1 | De Broglie, Loius "Investigations on Quantum Theory," 1925, in Ludwig, Wave Mechanics. This version contains extracts from de Broglie's complete 1925 dissertation. The complete dissertation is available as "Recherches sur la Théorie des Quanta" and, in English translation, as "On the Theory of Quanta". Notes |
James Simkins (45 min) | ||
| 11 | Nov 8 | The mechanical-optical analogy from Part II of: Schroedinger, Erwin "Quantization as a Problem of Proper Values." Part 1-4. In Ludwig, Wave Mechanics. Also in Schroedinger, Collected Papers on Wave Mechanics. Notes on Hamilton-Jacobi theory. Notes on optical-mechanical analogy. |
No warm up exercise this week. | Nora Boyd (45 min) |
| Nov 8 | P. A. M. Dirac, "On the Theory of Quantum Mechanics," Proceedings of the Royal Society of London. Series A, Vol. 112, No. 762 (Oct. 1, 1926), pp. 661-677. Tom's notes. |
Tom Pashby (45 min) | ||
| Paper proposals due Nov 8 | ||||
| Nov 15-17 | PSA 2012 San Diego. No seminar | |||
| Nov 22 | Thanksgiving Recess | |||
| 12 | Nov 29 | Dirac's early contribution to quantum electrodynamics P. A. M. Dirac, "The Quantum Theory of the Emission and Absorption of Radiation" Proc. R. Soc. Lond. A 1927 114, 243-265. Tom's Notes. |
XIII | Tom Pashby and Michael Miller |
| 13 | Dec 6 | Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle: Heisenberg, W. "The Physical Content of Quantum Kinematics and Mechanics," Trans "Über den anschaulichen Inhalt der quantentheoretischen Kinematik and Mechanik," Zeitschrift für Physik, 43 (1927), pp. 172-98. In Wheeler and Zurek with commentary. Also translated as "The Actual Content of Quantum Theoretical Kinematics and Mechanics." (By NASA?) Other possible topics that we did not cover: The three von Neumann papers of 1927 (Marina Baldissera Pacchetti) Proofs of the equivalence of wave and matrix mechanics |
Jeff Sykora (assisted by Dennis Lehmkuhl) 45 min |
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| Dec 6 | General Discussion Preparation: See warm-up exercise XIV. |
XIV | All | |
| Friday, Dec 14 | Term papers due |