This textbook takes a broad yet thorough approach to mechanics, aimed at bridging the gap between classical analytic and modern differential geometric approaches to the subject. Developed by the authors from over 30 years of teaching experience, the presentation is designed to give students an overview of the many different models used through the history of the field—from Newton to Hamilton—while also painting a clear picture of the most modern developments. The text is organized into two parts. The first focuses on developing the mathematical framework of linear algebra and differential geometry necessary for the remainder of the book. Topics covered include tensor algebra, Euclidean and symplectic vector spaces, differential manifolds, and absolute differential calculus. The second part of the book applies these topics to kinematics, rigid body dynamics, Lagrangian and Hamiltonian dynamics, Hamilton–Jacobi theory, completely integrable systems, statistical mechanics of equilibrium, and impulsive dynamics, among others. This new edition has been completely revised and updated and now includes almost 200 exercises, as well as new chapters on celestial mechanics, one-dimensional continuous systems, and variational calculus with applications. Several Mathematica® notebooks are available to download that will further aid students in their understanding of some of the more difficult material. Unique in its scope of coverage and method of approach, Classical Mechanics with Mathematica® will be useful resource for graduate students and advanced undergraduates in applied mathematics and physics who hope to gain a deeper understanding of mechanics.

The Consortium for Upper Level Physics Software (CUPS) has developed a comprehensive series of Nine Book/Software packages that Wiley will publish in FY '95 and '96. CUPS is an international group of 27 physicists, all with extensive backgrounds in the research, teaching, and development of instructional software. The project is being supported by the National Science Foundation (PHY-9014548), and it has received other support from the IBM Corp., Apple Computer Corp., and George Mason University. The Simulations being developed are: Astrophysics, Classical Mechanics, Electricity & Magnetism, Modern Physics, Nuclear and Particle Physics, Quantum Mechanics, Solid State, Thermal and Statistical, and Waves and Optics.

Classical Mechanics, Second Edition presents a complete account of the classical mechanics of particles and systems for physics students at the advanced undergraduate level. The book evolved from a set of lecture notes for a course on the subject taught by the author at California State University, Stanislaus, for many years. It assumes the reader has been exposed to a course in calculus and a calculus-based general physics course. However, no prior knowledge of differential equations is required. Differential equations and new mathematical methods are developed in the text as the occasion demands. The book begins by describing fundamental concepts, such as velocity and acceleration, upon which subsequent chapters build. The second edition has been updated with two new sections added to the chapter on Hamiltonian formulations, and the chapter on collisions and scattering has been rewritten. The book also contains three new chapters covering Newtonian gravity, the Hamilton-Jacobi theory of dynamics, and an introduction to Lagrangian and Hamiltonian formulations for continuous systems and classical fields. To help students develop more familiarity with Lagrangian and Hamiltonian formulations, these essential methods are introduced relatively early in the text. The topics discussed emphasize a modern perspective, with special note given to concepts that were instrumental in the development of modern physics, for example, the relationship between symmetries and the laws of conservation. Applications to other branches of physics are also included wherever possible. The author provides detailed mathematical manipulations, while limiting the inclusion of the more lengthy and tedious ones. Each chapter contains homework problems of varying degrees of difficulty to enhance understanding of the material in the text. This edition also contains four new appendices on D'Alembert's principle and Lagrange's equations, derivation of Hamilton’s principle, Noether’s theorem, and conic sections.

This textbook presents basic and advanced computational physics in a very didactic style. It contains very-well-presented and simple mathematical descriptions of many of the most important algorithms used in computational physics. The first part of the book discusses the basic numerical methods. The second part concentrates on simulation of classical and quantum systems. Several classes of integration methods are discussed including not only the standard Euler and Runge Kutta method but also multi-step methods and the class of Verlet methods, which is introduced by studying the motion in Liouville space. A general chapter on the numerical treatment of differential equations provides methods of finite differences, finite volumes, finite elements and boundary elements together with spectral methods and weighted residual based methods. The book gives simple but non trivial examples from a broad range of physical topics trying to give the reader insight into not only the numerical treatment but also simulated problems. Different methods are compared with regard to their stability and efficiency. The exercises in the book are realised as computer experiments.

The new edition of a classic text that concentrates on developing general methods for studying the behavior of classical systems, with extensive use of computation. We now know that there is much more to classical mechanics than previously suspected. Derivations of the equations of motion, the focus of traditional presentations of mechanics, are just the beginning. This innovative textbook, now in its second edition, concentrates on developing general methods for studying the behavior of classical systems, whether or not they have a symbolic solution. It focuses on the phenomenon of motion and makes extensive use of computer simulation in its explorations of the topic. It weaves recent discoveries in nonlinear dynamics throughout the text, rather than presenting them as an afterthought. Explorations of phenomena such as the transition to chaos, nonlinear resonances, and resonance overlap to help the student develop appropriate analytic tools for understanding. The book uses computation to constrain notation, to capture and formalize methods, and for simulation and symbolic analysis. The requirement that the computer be able to interpret any expression provides the student with strict and immediate feedback about whether an expression is correctly formulated. This second edition has been updated throughout, with revisions that reflect insights gained by the authors from using the text every year at MIT. In addition, because of substantial software improvements, this edition provides algebraic proofs of more generality than those in the previous edition; this improvement permeates the new edition.

The Consortium for Upper Level Physics Software (CUPS) has developed a comprehensive series of Nine Book/Software packages that Wiley will publish in FY `95 and `96. CUPS is an international group of 27 physicists, all with extensive backgrounds in the research, teaching, and development of instructional software. The project is being supported by the National Science Foundation (PHY-9014548), and it has received other support from the IBM Corp., Apple Computer Corp., and George Mason University. The Simulations being developed are: Astrophysics, Classical Mechanics, Electricity & Magnetism, Modern Physics, Nuclear and Particle Physics, Quantum Mechanics, Solid State, Thermal and Statistical, and Wave and Optics.

The school held at Villa Marigola, Lerici, Italy, in July 1997 was very much an educational experiment aimed not just at teaching a new generation of students the latest developments in computer simulation methods and theory, but also at bringing together researchers from the condensed matter computer simulation community, the biophysical chemistry community and the quantum dynamics community to confront the shared problem: the development of methods to treat the dynamics of quantum condensed phase systems.This volume collects the lectures delivered there. Due to the focus of the school, the contributions divide along natural lines into two broad groups: (1) the most sophisticated forms of the art of computer simulation, including biased phase space sampling schemes, methods which address the multiplicity of time scales in condensed phase problems, and static equilibrium methods for treating quantum systems; (2) the contributions on quantum dynamics, including methods for mixing quantum and classical dynamics in condensed phase simulations and methods capable of treating all degrees of freedom quantum-mechanically.