SOFT CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS

Graduate

This course utilizes a variety of tools developed within the general framework of statistical and solid-state physics to study the structural and dynamic properties of a number of important soft-condensed matter systems, including: polymers, liquid crystals, and membranes. Some key topics include: (1) Liquid crystals: elasticity, deformations, surface effects, fluctuations and scattering; (2) Polymers: chain conformations, mixtures and phase behaviour, motion in melts and glasses (viscoelasticity, relaxation, reptation); (3) Membranes: two and three-dimensional networks, self-assembly of amphiphiles, thermal fluctuations in membrane shape, bilayer bending and surface curvature. One of the goals of the course is to introduce students to a variety of important analytical methods, including: mean-field theory, density functional theory, Landau-Ginzberg theory, and renormalization-group theory. In addition, a number of key computational methods are employed to explore the properties of some simple polymeric systems, including: Monte Carlo, Molecular Dynamics and Discontinuous Molecular Dynamics. PREREQUISITE: Admission to a graduate program in Science HOURS OF CREDIT: 3