P541
Electromagnetic Theory I
Syllabus , Spring
2016
Instructor: Prof. Elbio Dagotto, edagotto@utk.edu,
office room 302
(in front of elevator, third
floor),
Form for the students to fill the first day can be found here
Text: “Classical Electrodynamics” by J. D. Jackson, third edition, John
Wiley & Sons editors. This is a book considered
“difficult’” but
it is widely used in most Physics
Departments for this type of classes.
E&M from
must take and survive.
We will attempt to cover the first
11 chapters of
In practice, perhaps we will only
cover 9 or 10 of them. My preference
is that you learn deeply a few
topics, than superficially many.
Near the end of the semester, some
of the lectures on radiation will
be given following “Introduction to Electrodynamics”,
third edition,
by David J. Griffiths,. This book
is excellent and can provide a solid
foundation for our course since there
is a substantial overlap with
You may also need a table of
functions and table of integrals (such
as “Table of Integrals, Series, and
Products”, fifth edition,
I. S. Gradshteyn et al., editors,
Academic Press) to solve some
of the homework problems. Or just
find integrals via Google
or using Mathematica. This class
is about physics, not math, thus
solving integrals should not be
our focus.
Some of the items to be covered
are from sources other than
Jackson or Griffiths. In these
cases, I will provide suitable URLs
to lean the topics or hand-written scanned
noted in a PDF.
Lectures: Tuesdays and Thursdays 9:40 to 10:55.
Please arrive on time.
The room is Physics 306.
The lectures will appear in the web
page after being
delivered, but I encourage that you also take
notes to understand
better the context of the discussions.
During lectures you can ask for
any clarification you wish, or even
any other question as long as
it is related to the topic under discussion.
But if the question is
“off topic” I will postpone the answer to later.
Math level: If you have passed a mathematical course
about vector calculus,
and if you know the
basics of second order differential equations
then you have sufficient
background for this class.
In this link you can find a PDF with vector
calculus mathematics
if you need a review. Or
just read the topic from the introductory
chapters of
Office hours: Mondays 2:15 to 3:15. Many students prefer
email consultation:
you can send emails with comments/questions
at any time. You can
also scan formulas that you may
struggle with and send them to me as a PDF.
Schedule: First lecture: Thursday January 14th.
Last lecture: Thursday April 28th.
Total number of lectures:
29.
Spring break: M-F March 14 – 18.
Final exam: take home
exam given to you the last week of class.
The official 2015-2016
calendar of UT can be found here.
Web page: http://sces.phys.utk.edu/~dagotto/electromag/index2016.htm
Homework: Due on Thursday at the beginning of class,
following assignment
on previous Thursday. The
assignments will be listed in the web
page. The homework will
be graded by a grader and return to you.
Each problem set will be
graded on a scale from 0 to 10.
The homework grade will be
normalized to 40 points at the end
of the semester.
Solutions to all homework problems will be
available in the webpage
after the deadline.
I will be reluctant to
accept excuses for returning the
homework late, since you
will always be given a full week of
time. But if a real
emergency arises, I will understand.
In the early stages of
setting up the solution of a HW problem,
I encourage discussion
among students. Often you only need a quick
tip to start. But then it
is expected that you solve all the problems
yourself.
It is crucial that you
present the homework, as well as the exams,
in a well-organized
manner, with framed results, sufficient detail for
the intermediate
steps, and a discussion of any
assumption you
may be making along the
path towards the solution.
Prepare sketches by hand
of the results you found, i.e.
analyze if the solution
makes sense via special cases, such
as asymptotic behaviors.
No need to save paper!
Some problems will be of
the form “Read the following URL”.
These are reading problems
that supplement the material
learned in the lectures.
While I cannot be sure that you did
read the assignment, it
would be unfortunate that you miss
the chance to learn more
about the subject of our class.
Grader: Our grader this semester will be Chris Coppola.
His email is cecoppola@gmail.com
Every HW deadline day,
please leave directly your HW in
the mailbox of Mr. Coppola.
He does not have an office in the
physics building (works at
ORNL) but he can answer some questions
if needed in the
Or simply ask questions by
email.
Exams: There will be two “midterm”
take-home exams. You will be notified
at least one week in advance
of the precise day when the midterms
will be given. I will
deliver one less lecture per exam, to free some
time for you to work on the
exam and to allow for consultation if needed.
There will be a final exam, in a
“take-home exam” format.
The problem exams will be
similar to the HW problems. Thus,
I advice that instead of
trying to solve additional problems of
(a difficult task even for
the professor) that you instead focus
on understanding deeply the
HW problems and the problems
explained in the lectures.
In your solutions provide sufficient
detail, as recommended for
the HW.
Grading: 50 points for exams (15 each midterm, 20
final);
40 points for homework;
10 for class participation.
More than E&M:
Besides E&M, this class
is also about preparing you for the future.
Clicking here you can find the list of top 10
qualities that
employers look for in new
college graduates. Items 4 and 7 read
4. The ability to think
clearly about complex problems.
7. The ability to be
creative and innovative in solving problems.
By studying E&M from
qualities. Even item 3
3. The ability to write and
speak well.
will be further developed
during the writing of the homework
problems and specially the
three exams.