Customer Reviews

Quantum Mechanics (2 vol. set)

5 star:		(20)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Most of what ought to have been said about this book has been said in previous reviews. It is missing a few crucial topics such as group theory, Lie algebras, and the Bell inequality, but it is extremely well-written, and the treatment of topics which are contained is nothing short of thorough. Reading this book is an illuminating experience.

Wiley & Sons (the publisher) fall short in their treatment of the book. This may read like a modern classic, but it is put together like a telephone book. The paper binding is extremely flimsy (given the size of the book, that is to be expected), and the covers are of such low quality that not only do they scuff, crease, and dent easily, but they stick to surfaces when only a bit of dampness is present, and are impossible to remove without damage.

For the price, one ought to expect more. A book like this deserves to be in a rounded, full-cloth, non-acid edition. At the very least, they could have put it in a textbook binding with sturdy cardboard covers. Timeless references ought to take more abuse than the Yellow Pages.

The authors, well-known contributors to the field of quantum optics, have given in these 2 volumes probably the best overview of quantum mechanics at the first-year graduate level. Having used these books both as a graduate student and as a lecturer, I have found that there are not too many things in the book that I find in any way troubling. The only minus might be the number of exercises: there are really not enough that are representative of the concepts covered in the book. Also, there is no discussion of entanglement of states, this reflecting more than anything the date of publication. Entanglement has grown in importance in recent years due to the intense research in quantum computation. The inclusion of a discussion of entanglement would still be justified even though it was not an immensely popular topic at the time of writing.

The first volume covers in detail the mathematical formalism of quantum mechanics along with its physical motivation, the latter given in the first chapter. And, both in this volume and the second, the authors include a large set of "complements" to each chapter. All of them are very well-written and instructors can fine tune the course using them as needed or as time permits. The treatment of the tensor product of state spaces is especially well done, and the authors give a physical example of its use via the two-dimensional infinite well. Chapter 3 is a very long and absorbing overview of the physical foundations of quantum mechanics. The authors introduce the concept of an 'insufficiently selective measurement device', not found in other textbooks on quantum mechanics, and one that can be integrated easily into discussions of the foundations of quantum mechanics. In the complements to this chapter, the reader will find a sound presentation of gauge invariance in quantum mechanics and a brief overview of the path integral approach to quantization. Due to its importance in quantum field theory, the latter could perhaps be expanded into an entire chapter if a future edition of this book is written. The authors also include a discussion of the physics of a particle in a periodic potential, paving the way for a later course in condensed matter physics. A thorough presentation of the harmonic oscillator is included in Chapter 5 of this volume, and the authors include an elementary discussion of the quantization of the electromagnetic field in a complement to this chapter. And, again anticipating a later study of condensed matter physics, the reader is introduced to the physics of an infinite set of coupled harmonic oscillators, i.e. the physics of phonons. Atomic physics of course is not forgotten by the authors, as they spend an entire chapter on the central potential, and include several excellent complements on atomic orbitals and diatomic molecules. The physics and mathematics of angular momenta in quantum physics is discussed in chapter six, as preparation for the more detailed treatment of spin systems in volume 2.

The authors begin volume 2 with a brief treatment of scattering theory, concentrating mostly on the scattering off a central potential. The authors continue the discussion of angular momenta begun in volume 1 and here show the reader how to deal with the addition of angular momenta. Clebsch-Gordon coefficients, spherical harmonics, and the Wigner-Eckhart theorem are treated in detail.

No doubt the most important topic that the authors treat in these two volumes is on perturbation theory, for it is the calculation of cross sections and other physically relevant quantities and their comparison with experiment that give quantum mechanics its ultimate validity as a physical theory. Chapters 11 and 12 on stationary perturbation theory and the fine and hyperfine structure of the hydrogen atom serve as a good introduction to the methods of perturbation theory. The use of numerical methods and the computer is of course the favored method of calculation these days, and will remain throughout the 21st century. As more powerful machines are built and more sophisticated algorithms are developed, more problems in quantum physics of a nonperturbative nature will be tackled, allowing greater insight into and perhaps changes to quantum mechanics.

A very easy introduction to quantum mechanics with supplementary topics designed to complement the basic chapters expanding the material to cover advanced topics such as phonons, etc.

Mathematical formulation is gradually brought to light after the basic ideas are explored. The level of mathematical rigour is adequate with appendices as needed. A degree of vector calculus and linear algebra is presumed but more advanced topics in hilbert space, operator theory, dirac notation and tensor products are developed as needed.

However, most importantly the ideas of quantum mechanics and assumptions are explicitly stated, in fact listed which was refreshing. Often introductory texts fail to bring together all the assumptions and then derive the theory leaving one bewildered. This probably has much to do with the history of quantum mechanics rather than poor literary skills. Regardless it was nice to see and much appreciated.

The problems range from very easy to difficult but solvable with some effort and thought. Most importantly the problems highlight important ideas and basic calculations which serve as models to approach more difficult problems.

The books cannot be read as novels and I suggest completing or at least attempting all the problems if you wish to have a solid understanding of nonrelativitic quantum mechanics.

After reading the book and solving the problems you should be able to state the assumptions of quantum mechanics with experimental proof for such and be fluent in it's mathematical foundations. Consequently, you should be able to approach a solution to most problems encountered in introductory quantum mechanics.

For example you should be able to quantize the appropriate classical quantity ( energy for example in the case of the harmonic oscillator ), find it's eigenvalues and eigenstates and corresponding wave equations ( where appropriate ) and then derive the mean values for various quantities and derive their time evolution etc etc.

I found the book indispensable for further personal study in quantum field theory and a very useful reference for refreshing forgotten ideas.

For those of you with no physics background, like myself, I suggest reading Fenymann lectures in physics vol 1-3 for a brief non-technical overview of the IDEAS of physics. I then suggest reading intro to mechanics by kleppner ( do all the problems ) and then electromagnetism by purcell ( do all the problems ). You should then delve into quantum mechanics ( you may wish to brush up on wave mechanics as well ).

For those of you who disdain mathematics there are a number of quantum mechanics books " for the masses" you can read but none will give a grasp of the topic. You must overcome your fear and learn the basic ideas of mathematics.

The difference is between seeing the sunset and having one described to you.

I just finished a graduate level quantum mechanics course where Cohen-Tannoudji's "Quantum Mechanics" was the primary text. This work as both strengths and weaknesses. On the plus side, it is as extremely comprehensive and detailed treatment of non-relativistic quantum mechanics as can be found, and makes an outstanding reference work. On the down-side, it took me half of the semester to learn how to find things quickly within the text, and I never felt as if it really helped me learn quantum in the intuitive sense. While the mathematical formalism was there, the language CT used to describe these phenomena seemed lacking. Fortunately, my copy of Sakurai helped me more with these less formal descriptions, and made a welcome complement to Cohen-Tannoudji. While CT may be the most comprehensive text I have seen, I would not recommend it being the only text used for a class.

I do not understand the reviewers who claim this book gives no exercises or good examples. These books are about the only graduate-level QM books which do. Not only that, they explore more interesting/complex material in their "complements" at the end of each chapter. This is far more than can be said of a book like Sakurai's, say, which is also a standard text.

As someone who likes a little bit of rigor, and a lot of explicit explanation of the correspondence between mathematics, this book does wonders. It strongly emphasizes the linear space nature of QM: as an average student, I liked this approach, though I'll wager that faster students and those with less taste for rigor will find this too slow-going. So many things in QM which seem to be mysteries (e.g. sub-diagonalization) when presented by the average terse graduate text become very clear with the presentation in these books. Yes, the authors tend to be more verbose than other authors of graduate texts, but this is not a shortcoming in my view.

I can't recommend this book enough for the beginning student in QM. Even senior-level undergrads would benefit from using, or skimming, this book. These books do require the reader to have had an advanced calculus class where Fourier methods for solving differential equations were studied: one may be able to learn some QM without it, but it would be a hindrance not to have had it.

Almost no words needs to be said about this masterwork.
And rare are serious students of quantum mechanics who could really afford to ignore it.
Several important techniques and recent developments are omitted, but having grasped the material presented in these two volumes, learning further about quantum mechanics will prove astonishingly straightforward.
A caution remark is in order, though : these books don't really suit to self-study, due to their sometimes rather lengthy, verbose exposition, which could well quickly fade away an initially strong motivation for studying quantum mechanics, if not bolstered by a teacher's or fellow student's incentives.

A good, "deep" and complete presentation of quantum mechanics. The first chapter is great for basic ideas of QM. This is followed by a chapter on the mathematical tools of quantum mechanics and a very good chapter that lays out the postulates of quantum mechanics. Then it covers spin, the harmonic oscillator, angular momentum, and the hydrogen atom. It seems to me the book is the best around for teaching Dirac notation and matrix mechanics. Each chapter is accompanied by appendices that develop further detail or provide examples of various concepts. For help with problem solving, I recommend Quantum Mechanics Demystified and the Schaum's Outline of Quantum Mechanics. For a good reading companion, I recommend the Griffiths Quantum Mechanics book.

Cohen-Tannoudji writes an excellent QM text for first-year graduate or advanced undergraduate students. The book is well organized, complete, and contains fundamental concepts and relations as well as some more interesting, advanced topics. It takes some time to get through, and not a book that you can read at the breakfast table, but the reward is well worth the effort. A good supplement would probably be Sakurai. I think it is better than Griffiths, if more didactic. I have used the book for a first-semester graduate QM course after a one-semester introductory course with Griffiths. It is a good reference book as well as a main text.

I read parts of Cohen Tannoudji as an undergraduate and found them helpful. However, I should warn potential buyers of several problems with this book, which is the reason why I'm writing this review: despite its huge size, Cohen Tannoudji omits many important topics which are crucial for graduates - I'm not just talking about, say, relativistic quantum mechanics and field quantization; I'm talking about the Wigner Eckhart theorem, spherical tensor operators, group theory, path integration, second order degenerate perturbation theory, fock spaces and a multitude of other topics, all quite important. That means that you're paying a lot of money for something which is only "half a book", since you will sooner or later have to go out and buy another reference for those topics. I agree that Cohen Tannoudji do give detailed explanations of the material they do cover, but there is a pay to pay, viz., this is not a comprehensive book.
I hope this will make you think twice before buying - not that I have anything against this book, on the contrary, I think it explains quite well the topics it does choose to cover.

Simply staten this is the top text in the nonrelativistic QM area.The book covers the whole subject with a very shrewd approach:each chapter covers the essentials of a specific sector of QM and then appendices deal with applications.So you can choose what you need most and skip the rest.The exposition is very clear and detailed (for example there is a simply wonderful chapter on addition of angular momenta)and never fails to build the necessary mathematical tools as needed.I rate this book 5 stars only because there is not a 6 stars option!