Arizona State University

Advanced Laboratory I
PHY 334 Spring 2005


Class Hours
Tuesday (SLN 81748)
1:40-2:30 in PSF 306
2:40-4:30 in PSF 377
other hours to be arranged


Thursday (SLN 54908)
12:40-1:30 in PSF 366
1:40-3:30 in PSF 377
other hours to be arranged


Instructors
Tuesday: Gary Adams
Office: PSF 430
Phone: (480) 727-6511
Email: Gary.Adams@asu.edu
Office hours: MW 4:00-5:30; F 3:40-4:40; and by appointment.
Help Study: TH 2:40-3:30


Thursday: Martha R. McCartney
Office: PSB 347
Phone: (480) 965-4558
Email: Molly.McCartney@asu.edu
Office hours: Monday 10:40-11:30; Tuesday 1:40-3:30; and by appointment
Help-Study: TBA


Teaching Assistant
Jim Ball
Email: JAMES.P.BALL@asu.edu
Office hours: TBA
Help-Study: TBA

Course Objective:
Development of experimental techniques and data analysis skills; introduction to report writing; laboratory notebook usage. Students should purchase two full-size bound laboratory notebooks (you should be able to tape or paste 8.5x11 sheets into your notebook). Each student will maintain his/her own laboratory notebook and will submit an individual lab report.

Experiments:
Four to five experiments will be performed in groups of approximately four students. The lab schedule is available here. Descriptions of the experiments are available here.

Location:
PSF306 (Tuesdays 1:40-2:30) and PSF336 (Thursdays 12:40-1:30) are reserved for any necessary meetings of the full class. These meetings will be announced as necessary. However, most weeks the entire three hour class time will be spent in PSF-377.

Email:
Your ASU email address will be used to disseminate information. Students are responsible for receiving it. Make sure that your ASU email address is functional and that your spam filter, if operating, allows emails from both instructors and from our TA.

Reference Books:
The following books have been requested on the Reserve List at Noble Library:

  • Adrian C. Melissinos, Experiments in Modern Physics
  • The 1966 version has both Thermionic Emission and Compton Scattering. There are also several copies available in PSF377.

  • John R. Taylor, An Introduction to Error Analysis

  • Bevington and Robinson, Data Reduction and Error Analysis
  • If you plan to be an experimental physicist, it is worthwhile to purchase a personal copy of Bevington. It is a standard and often-used reference. In the 3rd edition, the rules for propagation of errors are on pages 48-49.

  • J.J. Brehm and W.J. Mullin, Introduction to the Structure of Matter
  • Noble's Copy was listed as missing, but another has been ordered, and will be on reserve when it arrives. Brehm and Mullin contains useful information for both the X-Ray Physics and Compton experiments.

    Grading:
    The due dates for each lab are available on the Lab Schedule. For each lab, each student will turn in their lab notebook plus a 2-3 page summary of the lab, which should indicate where, in the lab notebook, all relevant data, calculations, graphs, etc. can be found. The lab grade will consist of the instructor's evaluation of both the student's lab notebook and the written summary. For the Astrophysics Labs, these instructions will be superseded by instructions from Paul Scowen.

    The full text of the syllabus is also available as a pdf file.