PH111: student talks schedule

I've made up a preliminary schedule for your talks, which you can find here.

As a reminder, talks should be about 20 minutes in length, with a question & answer period of about 5 minutes following each talk. Timing will be rather strictly enforced so we can get through all of your talks in only three class periods. Finally, keep in mind that it is expected that all group members contribute to the oral presentation.

The first set of talks is on 16 November, which is only two weeks away ...

PH111: links relevant to today's lecture

These are by no means exhaustive, but are just a few introductory-level discussions of some of the things we talked about today.

A nanotechnology lecture by Feynman from 1959 (!).

Information processing and thermodynamics.

Physical limits of computing.

PH111: information storage physics

Some of the slides I'll use today are here.

After the lecture, I'll try to update them to include the things I'm going to do on the whiteboard ...

PH111: Intelligent extra-terrestrial life

This topic just keeps coming up.

PH111: Drake equation, next seminar

Interesting article about updates to the Drake equation.

Next week, I'll be giving the seminar again, this time on information storage physics. There will be some light reading posted later today, but for now you might peruse this older talk I gave. (Warning, 22Mb PDF.) It is specifically about magnetic information storage, but might get you thinking along the right lines.

Comic relevant to the last PH111 lecture

Regarding the Drake equation.

PH111 Lecture 2: back-of-the-envelope calculations

Today I gave a lecture about estimation and back-of-the-envelope calculations. The slides I used are here, though I did quite a few additional problems not mentioned in the slides.

I made heavy use of this book in preparing my lecture, and it is highly recommended if you have an interest in how to quickly estimate the answer to even the most absurd-sounding problems. More than that, it is one of the few books of this sort that actually teaches you how to do approximate calculations systematically, rather than just trying to dazzle you with arcane knowledge.

A fun read, and it contains most of the problems I worked out in the lecture today. And some much, much more odd ones.

Next time (2 weeks from today, given labor day is next week) we'll have a lecture from Dr. White on "The Big Bang" and "The largest explosions in the universe." We'll keep you posted if there is any reading you need to do ahead of time ...

PH111 Intro physics seminar

This semester, for the first time, we'll be offering an introductory physics seminar. It is a 1-credit course with no prerequisites, and meets just once a week Monday 4-5:30pm in 338 Gallalee. Here's the catalog blurb:

Lecture series on current topics in physics. Open to all undergraduates, aimed at students just starting their university education who want a broad introduction to exciting developments in modern physics at an introductory level. Faculty will present introductions to recent developments in physics, including student-suggested topics. The course will stress a conceptual understanding of everything from fundamental phenomena to recent technologies in terms of their basic underlying physical principles. Students present short research seminars on a topic of their choice once per semester.

You might also want to look at the list of possible topics, our tentative schedule, and the course syllabus. Also, here are the course intro slides from today.

There is room for plenty more if you'd like to join ... and even if you don't, I'll be continue information about PH111 lectures and so on here so you can follow along virtually at least.