Physics 232: Advanced Classical Electromagnetism
Spring 2015
Syllabus
Wednesday, January 28, 2015
Description
This course provides an advanced treatment of classical electromagnetism.
Topics
Special relativity, relativistic field theories, gauge invariance, the Maxwell equations, conservation
laws, time-independent phenomena, multipole expansions, electrodynamics and radiation theory,
radiation from rapidly-moving accelerating charges, scattering and diffraction, and macroscopic
averaged fields and propagation in matter. Additional topics may include relativistic particles
with spin, coherent states, superconductors, accelerator physics, renormalization, and magnetic
monopoles.
Prerequisites: Multivariable and vector calculus, Physics 153 (undergraduate electromagnetism
at the level of Griffiths), Physics 143a (first-semester undergraduate quantum mechanics at the
level of Griffiths or Townsend).
Teaching Staff
Jacob Barandes Course Head
Jefferson 349, x4-8138, barandes@physics.harvard.edu
Office Hours: Tuesdays and Fridays, 10:00am - 12:00pm, Jefferson 349
Christopher Frye Teaching Fellow
frye@physics.harvard.edu
Office Hours: TBD
Aavishkar Patel Teaching Fellow (Grader)
Course Website
https://canvas.harvard.edu/courses/907
Please remember to fill out the sign-up survey on the course website by 5:00pm on Friday,
January 30.
Lectures
Wednesdays and Fridays, 1:30pm - 3:00pm, Jefferson 356.
Sections
Sections provide an opportunity to ask more questions, feature relevant examples and exercises,
and also sometimes cover advanced side topics. Students should plan to attend one section time
per week. Please fill out the sign-up survey on the course website to indicate your available times.
Homework
Homework (60%) is assigned weekly on Wednesdays, and is officially due at the beginning of
class on the following Wednesday, but students have a two-day grace period and can hand in
their homework at the beginning of class on the next Friday instead. (Students may freely take
advantage of this two-day grace period as many times as needed, no questions asked.) Collaboration
is permitted and students who have difficulty finding a study group should contact the course head
or teaching fellow. However, students must write or type up their own homework sets with their
own answers and hand them in individually, as well as list all their collaborators. Use of LATEX is
encouraged, as well as Mathematica, especially to simplify formulas, unless the use of Mathematica
renders an entire portion of a problem trivial. Full simplification is necessary for full credit, and
students should attach their source code for any nontrivial Mathematica calculations. Use of the
Internet for general reference purposes is permitted provided students cite all external resources
they use, but students are not permitted to look up specific exercises or solutions on the Internet
or elsewhere. In fairness to other students, late homework will not be accepted beyond the two-day
grace period, but one homework grade will be dropped automatically at the end of the course in
a manner that maximizes the students overall homework grade.
Final Exam
There will be one take-home final exam (40%), to be picked up in the Physics Library at 10:00am
on Monday, May 4 and to be dropped off in the Physics Library by 5:00pm on Wednesday, May 6.
Personal lecture notes, homework sets, the official course textbook (Jackson), scientific hand calculators or equivalent computer software, and the course website are permitted, but collaboration
of any kind is not. Students are also not permitted to use other textbooks, other students lecture
notes, Mathematica or other scientific or symbolic computing software, graphing or programmable
calculators, or the Internet beyond the course website. Late final exams will not be accepted, even
for students who pick up their final exams late.
Textbook
The official text of the course is Classical Electrodynamics (Jackson, third edition). Additional
recommended books are Modern Electrodynamics (Zangwill) and Classical Electromagnetism in a
Nutshell (Garg).
Accommodations for Students with Disabilities
Students needing academic adjustments or accommodations because of a documented disability
must present their faculty letter from the Accessible Education Office (AEO) and speak with the
instructor of the course by the end of the second week of the term, Friday, February 6. Failure to
do so may result in the instructors inability to respond in a timely manner. All discussions will
remain confidential, although faculty may contact AEO to discuss appropriate implementation.
