General Physics

Course Description
General Physics is a one-and-a-half semester course designed to present concepts and applications of the following topics: kinematics, dynamics, gravitation, thermodynamics, electromagnetism and
optics. There are four hours of lecture/exercise each week.


Mechanics
1. Physical quantities and their measurement.
2. Kinematics of point masses. Reference frames.
3. Dynamics of point masses. Newton's laws.
4. Work and energy. Energy conservation.
5. Angular momentum and torques.
6. Linear momentum. Scattering of point masses.
7. Kinematic and dynamics of rigid bodies.

Elettromagnetism
1. Electrostatic: Coulomb's law and principle of superposition.
2. Electric field. Electric potential.
3. Gauss law and its applications.
4. Electrostatic energy. Dielectrics.
5. Electric current and charge conservation. Ohm's law.
6. Magnetostatics: the magnetic field.
7. Magnetic force on charges and currents: Lorentz force.
8. Magnetic field generated by stationary currents. Biot-Savart law and Ampére's law.
9. Time dependent electric and magnetic fields. Induced currents. Faraday's law.
Displacement current: Ampere-Maxwell's law.

Optics
1. Electromagnetic waves and the electromagnetic spectrum.
2. Geometric optics.
3. Physical optics: diffraction and interference.