Soft Condensed Matter

 

Instructor:           Reza Ejtehadi

Time:                   Sunday and Tuesday, 10:30 – 12:00

Room:                 Physics 412

         

 

First lecture:       Sunday, September 25st, 2005 (3 Mehr)

Last lecture:        Sunday,  January 2th, 2006 (11 Day)

 

What does soft matter mean?

          If you are not a "search engine", "spy tool", or  "machine viewer" then you are a "soft matter machine".
          To have a better idea about what is categorized as soft matter I recommend you to read following articles:

1.     M. E. Cate, Soft Condensed Matter, cond-mat/0411650.

2.     P. G. de Gennes, Soft Matter, Rev. Mod. Phys. 64, 645 (1992).

3.     T. A. Witten, Insights from soft condensed matter, Rev. Mod. Phys. 71, S367 (1999).

Text books:

Soft Condensed Matter by Richard A L Jones.
Principles of Condensed Matter Physics by P M Chaikin, T C Lubensky (sections 1,2 and 6).
Statistical Thermodynamics of Surfaces, Interfaces, and Membranes by A Safran.

 

Further reading:

Soft Matter Physics: An Introduction by Maurice Kleman, Oleg D Laverntovich.
Biological Physics by Philip Nelson.
Structured Fluids: Polymers, Colloids, Surfactants  by Thomas A Witten.
Intermolecular and Surface Forces by J N Israelachvili.

 

Syllabus:

This is the first time that I am going to lecture this course. I hope to be able  to cover following subjects. The list is not time ordered.

·        Soft matter

·        Phase transition

·        Colloids

·        Polymers and Gels

·        Liquid Crystals

·        Self assembly

·        wetting

·        Membranes

·        Electrostatics

·        Biological macromolecules

 

Marking:

·       Homework                                                40%

·       Final exam                                                 60%

·       Bonus; demonstrations                             10%

 

Midterm exam:

·       (Takehome)
Interaction between two coloidal particles with radial anchoring boundry condition in a nematic liquid crystal. Following papers may be found helpful.

o      http://scitation.aip.org/getpdf/servlet/GetPDFServlet?filetype=pdf&id=PLEEE8000069000004041706000001&idtype=cvips&prog=normal

o      http://scitation.aip.org/getpdf/servlet/GetPDFServlet?filetype=pdf&id=PLEEE8000065000002021709000001&idtype=cvips&prog=normal

o      http://prola.aps.org/abstract/PRE/v55/i3/p2958_1

·       Due time:  84/9/29

Final exam:

·       Take home

·       Due: January 10th, 5:00 PM