Modern Physics (ISI)
Course Info:
- Department: Liberal Arts
- Area: Science and Mathematics
- Credit Hours: 3, Contact Hours: 45
- Course Number (SRISA): STEM 3102
- Course Number (Maryville University): TBA
Course Description:
This course covers Special relativity (plus a smidgen of General relativity), a few key concepts in Thermodynamics, and the historical background and Introductory ideas of Quantum mechanics. It is thus the bridge between the classical physics of the XIX century, which culminated with Maxwell’s equations beautifully encapsulating Electromagnetism, and the modern physics of the XX century.
The student will learn some of the limitations of classical physics and how they were solved with the revolutionary ideas that led to Special relativity and Quantum mechanics. The impacts of many of these ideas are not obvious at human speeds and scales, so a key goal of this course will be to start developing an intuition for concepts such as time dilation, length contraction, or tunnel effect.
This course runs through SRISA's external partners at ISI. SRISA students may take up to 1 course through an external partner.