1 Statistical Mechanics 1.1 Entropy StatisticalMechanicsisabranchofphysicsthatpervadesallother branches. Statistical mechanics is relevant to Newtonian mechanics, relativity,quantummechanics,andquantumfieldtheory. 1 Figure1: Statisticalmechanicsappliestoallrealmsofphysics.
A Crash Course in Statistical Mechanics A Crash Course in Statistical Mechanics Noah Miller December 27, 2018 Abstract A friendly introduction to statistical mechanics, geared towards covering the powerful methods physicists have developed for working in the subject. Contents
Therefore,therearetwo notionsofuncertaintyinquan- tumstatisticalmechanics: 1.Fundementalquantumuncertainty 2.Uncertainty due to the fact that you may not know the exact quantumstateyoursystemisinanyway. (Thisissometimescalled “classicaluncertainty.”)
Figure1: Statisticalmechanicsappliestoallrealmsofphysics. Its exact incarnation is a little different in each quadrant, but the basicdetailsareidentical. The most important quantityin statistical mechanics iscalled “en- tropy,” which we label by S.