PHYS 420/580: Computational Physics / Advanced Topics in Computational Physics

The best five energies for assignment 5

1425.55 (mixed decay: T=5.0*E1; T -= (T/10000+0.000001)/4;)
1435.82 (exponential decay: T=200.0*E1; T -= 0.0005*T)
1437.41 (linear decay: T=10.0*E1; T -= 0.0000001)
1438.71 (exponential decay: T=10.0*E1; T/=1.000001)
1443.65 (exponential decay: T=50.0*E1; T -= T*0.01)

My solution generates 1427.82 (quasi-exponential: T=150.0*E1; t=0; T *= (1.0-0.0005/log10(double(t++))))

#assignment5

A keen-eyed student has pointed out to me a mistake in Lab 6.

For a field living on a uniform grid with spacing $\mathrm{\Delta }x$, the most rapidly oscillating configuration has wavelength $2\mathrm{\Delta }x$, not $\mathrm{\Delta }x/2$ as written. I've posted the corrected version of the pdf to the web site.
#lab6

This Wednesday (Nov 28), we'll have the last of the term project presentations (Megan Engel). I'll use the remaining time to give a short lecture on parallel computing.

On Friday, we'll have a 5-minute quiz testing your familiarity with the basic concepts from Labs 5–8. Along the same lines as Quiz 1.

The two classes in the following week (Dec 3 and 5) will be devoted to exam review. Those of you not writing the exam can instead use the time to work on your term projects. Otherwise, please have a look at the exams from 2008, 2009, and 2010 — which are posted at http://www.ualberta.ca/~kbeach/phys420_580_2011.html — and indicate to me well in advance (via comments to this post) what aspects you feel would be most useful to review.

(You'll notice that the exams are similar in structure from year to year. You can expect much the same this time around.)

Both Assignment 5 and the term project final report are due on Wednesday, December 5. For Assignment 5, that is a hard deadline. In the case of the project, I will allow some wiggle room. For those of you who are absolutely desperate, I will accept reports that are available for download when I come into the office the morning of Monday, December 10. But I will almost certainly be better disposed towards those projects that come in earlier rather than later. (Keep in mind that I am required to turn in all grades shortly after students write the final on December 13. There are 25 projects and exam papers to grade, and there won't be enough time to do this if everyone turns in the term project as late as the 10th.)
#quiz2 #assignment5 #term_project

Just a reminder that student presentations start on the Monday, November 19 during our usual lecture period. Everyone enrolled in 420 and 580 should make an effort to attend. This is an opportunity to support your colleagues who have undertaken a term project and to learn from the broad array of topics and computational approaches they'll present.

Given the tight schedule—we'll have as many as three presentations per day—we should probably aim for 12 minutes of talk and 3 minutes of questions. Those of you presenting on a given day, please ensure that there is no wasted set-up time. I strongly suggest you bring a pdf presentation (either on a usb stick or made available online) that can be loaded in advance onto the "smart lecture station" (a Windows-based pc) at the front of the room. Otherwise, you can bring your own laptop, but do be ready to go immediately.

Keep in mind that this is not a specialized physics talk on your topic. Do sketch out the problem and why it's interesting, but spend the bulk of your time on discussing solution strategies, implementation details, and analysis of the data (if you have any yet).
#project_proposal

I've set aside four class periods to accommodate the large number of presentations this year. Please email me to sign up for a slot. (Discovery: indistinguishability aside, students are fermions at zero temperature.)

Monday, November 19

• empty state
• —fermi level—
• Marco Taucer

Wednesday, November 21

• Sarah Nowicki
• Tania Wood
• Jin Xu

Friday, November 23

• Samina Jabbar
• Yikai Yang
• Peter Legg

Monday, November 26

• Khaled Elshamouty
• Erika Moñoz Torres
• Hossna Gharaee

#term_project

Just a reminder that those of you not pursuing a term project are responsible for completing Assignment 4. According to the original schedule, this is due tomorrow (November 14).

Because of extensions I granted for the previous Assignments, all the due dates have crowded back toward the end of term. But there's not much more future to borrow against. So I would appreciate receiving Assignment 4 tomorrow, if possible. Otherwise, do try to get it to me by the following Monday.

I will post Assignment 5 later today.
#assignment4