8.231 Class Homepage

Physics of Solid I -- Fall 2009

Xiao-Gang Wen

Lecture: Mon. Wed. 2:30-4:00, at room 2-151 by Xiao-Gang Wen
E-mail: wen(at)dao(dot)mit(dot)edu
Office Hour: Fri. 4:00-5:00 (or any other time. Please call or e-mail first)
Office: 6C-317
Phone: 617-253-5016

Recitation: Fri. 3:00-4:00 at room 2-151 by Xiao-Gang Wen

Announcement

The quiz 2 will be given on Nov. 6 (Fri.) in class. It is an open-book open-note test. It will cover the first 7 prb. sets but mainly on prb. sets 4, 5, 6, 7
This Friday's recitation (Oct 16) will be shifted to start at 2:35 and end at 3:25.
The quiz 1 will be given on Sept 30 (Wed.) in class. It is an open-book open-note test. It will cover the first 3 prb. sets (only prob. 1, 2, 3 in p-set 3).

Class handouts

Syllabus

Lecture note 1

Lecture note 2

Lecture note 3

note 1

note 2

Lecture note 4

Lecture note 5

Lecture note 6

Lecture note on transport

Principle of emergence and superfluid

Prob. Set 1. Due Sept. 14 in class. Solutions
Reading: Kittel Chapter 1, Lecture note 1 (p. 1 -- 16)
Numerical experiment: Formation of crystal (actually nano-crystals)
Bravais lattice on Wikipedia
Bravais lattice on Steven Dutch's web site
Bravais lattice on www.tf.uni-kiel.de
many lattice structures, NaCl, CsCl, Diamond, Zincblende, La₂CuO₄ (High-T_c superconductor), LaOFeAs (Iron based superconductor)
Wigner-Seitz cells on wiki and their pictures

Prob. Set 2. Due Sept. 21 in class. Solutions
Reading: Kittel Chapter 2, 3, Lecture note 1 (p. 17 -- 27)
Crystal and diffraction,
Powder diffraction image.
Reciprocal lattice and Brillouin zones

Prob. Set 3. Due Sept. 28 in class. Solutions
Reading: Kittel Chapter 2, 3; Lecture note 2 (p. 29 -- 44).
Numerical experiment: Formation of Ionic crystals (actually nano-crystals)
Covalent bond of hydrogan molecule
Orbital hybridisation on Wiki
Hybridisation flash movie

From the carbon phase diagram 1 and the carbon phase diagram 2, we see that graphite is more stable under normal pressure and diamond is more stable only under high pressures.
Here are phase diagrams of some other materials.

Practice problems for quiz 1:
The problems in the first three problem sets.
The problems in Kittel's book: (2), (3), (5), (7) on page 44-45. (2), (5) on page 86.

Prob. Set 4. Due Oct. 13 in class. Solutions
Reading: Kittel Chapter 4, lecture note 3, Sound waves in square lattice

Prob. Set 5. Due Oct. 19 in class. Solutions
Reading: Kittel Chapter 4,5, lecture note 4. Sound waves in 1D lattice (2 atoms per unit cell).
a note on phonons, a note on thermal properties

Prob. Set 6. Due Oct. 26 in class. Solutions
Reading: Kittel Chapter 5,6, lecture note 4,5. A paper on amorphous silicon.
Properties of NaCl.

Prob. Set 7. The paper for prb7.1. Due Nov. 2 in class. Solutions
Reading: Kittel Chapter 6,7, lecture note 5, Brillouin Zones and their folding (some animations on zone folding is quite cool)

Practice problems for quiz 2:
The problems in the first seven problem sets.
The problems in Kittel's book: (4) on page 128. (5) on page 158. (1), (6) on page 182.

Prob. Set 8. Due Nov. 16 in class. Solutions
Reading: Kittel Chapter 6,7,8, lecture note 6.

Prob. Set 9. Due Nov. 23 in class.
Reading: Kittel Chapter 6, 8, lecture note 6, lecture note on transport. Two papers on graphene (experiment and theory). An article on application of thermal electric effect.

Numerical experiments:

Personal Homepage Xiao-Gang Wen homepage