Customer Reviews

Computational Methods In Physics And Engineering (2Nd Edition)

5 star:		(0)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This book is a fairly decent overview of computational physics. The author covers most of the topics that one would obtain in taking a senior level or first year graduate course in this subject. It could be used successfully in such a course as there are problem sets at the end of each chapter that can be solved most efficiently by writing programs. In addition, the author gives pseudocode throughout the book for the main algorithms. The most useful chapter to me was Chapter 7, which covered Monte Carlo techniques. The author is pretty thorough in his treatment of this subject, and does discuss how to apply this technique in calculating path integrals in quantum mechanics. Unfortunately, he limits his discussion to the harmonic oscillator and does not give any problem sets at the end of the chapter that will allow the reader to apply the techniques to other potentials in quantum mechanics (such as maybe the anharmonic oscillator or the double well potentials). The author also discusses finite difference methods and finite element methods in the last two chapters. The author unfortunately does not discuss the numerical solution of the Boltzmann transport equation, which is of interest to me. Overall though a pretty nice job, and will introduce the new comer to the field.

I went thru this book when I first received it, but recently used it as a reference for a computational Physics course I took. I am glad I had it. The only reason for the 4 stars, is no solutions to the problems at the ends of the chapters. I am a firm believer in learning by doing, and this book, although it has some good examples, needs to add answers to the problems, for immediate feedback. Otherwise, it is a good first introduction, and provides an excellent reference.