| CODE | PHY1150 | ||||||||||||
| TITLE | Electricity and Magnetism | ||||||||||||
| UM LEVEL | 01 - Year 1 in Modular Undergraduate Course | ||||||||||||
| MQF LEVEL | 5 | ||||||||||||
| ECTS CREDITS | 6 | ||||||||||||
| DEPARTMENT | Physics | ||||||||||||
| DESCRIPTION | The focus of this unit is on electricity and magnetism and gives an introduction to electromagnetic fields and forces. Electromagnetic forces quite literally dominate our everyday experience and this study-unit is to use the scientific method to come to understand the enormous variety of electromagnetic phenomena. The topics that will be covered are the following: - Scalar and Vector fields; - Electrostatic field (Charge, Coulomb's law, the principle of superposition, Electric field, (examples: electric dipole, line and ring charge)); - Gauss's law (Electric flux, field outside & inside hollow sphere of charge, infinitely long line charge, infinite plane charge, parallel plate capacitor); - Electrical potential (Electrostatic potential energy, line charge revisited, electric dipole, dipole in a uniform E-field, Poisson's equation); - Conductors & dielectrics (E-field due to charged conductor, E-field within dielectric, Susceptibility and permittivity, electric displacement); - Capacitors and capacitance (spherical capacitor, capacitors and dielectrics, capacitors in series and in parallel, energy stored in E-field, force between capacitor plates), Electrical currents; - Electric current (drift velocity, resistance, circuits, Kirchoff's laws); - Magnetostatics (Electromagnetic equations for static fields, Ampere's circuital law, Biot-Savart law, magnetic dipole, Lorentz equation, magnetic fields in matter). Study-unit Aims: This study-unit aims to introduce various concepts of electromagnetism as well as to establish a grounding in electromagnetism in preparation for more advanced units. It will provide students with the necessary background knowledge to understand and appreciate advanced applications of electromagnetics. Learning Outcomes: 1. Knowledge & Understanding By the end of the study-unit the student will be able to: - explain the basic electric and magnetic interactions due to charged particles and currents; - describe how the electric interactions due to single or collection of charged particles are embodied in the concepts of the electric field and the electric potential; - predict the motion of charged particles in electric and magnetic fields. 2. Skills By the end of the study-unit the student will be able to: - articulate the fundamental principles of electrostatics and magnetostatics; - use the mathematical methods of Gauss's and Amepere's law; - calculate the electric and magnetic fields from a distribution of charges or current; - determine the motion of electrically charged objects using principles of mechanics; - solve basic problems of electromotive induction (Faraday's and Lenz's law). Main Text/s and any supplementary readings: - H. Benson, University Physics. John Wiley & Sons, 1996. - F. J. Keller, W. E. Gettys and M. J. Skove, Physics. McGraw-Hill, 1993. - J. B. Marion and W. F. Hornyak, Physics for Science and Engineering. Holt-Saunders, 1983. - I. S. Grant and W. R. Phillips, The Elements of Physics. Oxford University Press, 2001. - H. D. Young and R. A. Freedman, University Physics. Addison Wesley, 2016. |
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| ADDITIONAL NOTES | Pre-Requisite Study-unit: MAT1091 - Mathematical Methods | ||||||||||||
| STUDY-UNIT TYPE | Lecture and Tutorial | ||||||||||||
| METHOD OF ASSESSMENT |
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| LECTURER/S | Lourdes Farrugia |
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The University makes every effort to ensure that the published Courses Plans, Programmes of Study and Study-Unit information are complete and up-to-date at the time of publication. The University reserves the right to make changes in case errors are detected after publication.
The availability of optional units may be subject to timetabling constraints. Units not attracting a sufficient number of registrations may be withdrawn without notice. It should be noted that all the information in the description above applies to study-units available during the academic year 2025/6. It may be subject to change in subsequent years. |
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