PHY3103 Statistical Mechanics

This course covers the fundamental postulates of statistical mechanics, which include quantum states, systems in contact, the different particle statistics and their applications, classical statistical mechanics, Canonical Ensemble, Grand canonical Ensemble, quantum statistical mechanics, ideal gas, equipartition of energy and specific heat capacities of diatomic gases, imperfect gas at low temperature and phase transitions

Course Objectives
By the end of this course, students should be able to

• Describe the state of a quantum mechanical system in a number of microstates
• Derive the distribution function for Maxwell- Boltzmann distribution
• Apply Maxwell’s velocity distribution 
• Calculate canonical partition functions for simple systems
• Apply Bose-Einstein and Fermi-Dirac distribution functions

Learning Out comes 
By the end of the course, students should be able to

• Discuss the relevance and application of the laws of thermodynamics
• Discuss the different statistical systems and their relevance to explaining physical thermal processes
• Compare and contrast quantum mechanics and statistical mechanics as theoretical approaches to explaining physical processes
• Discuss statistically the properties of ideal and imperfect gases
• Explain the classical and quantum theories of phase transition