Lecture Notes
Prof. em. Dr. D. Pescia, Department of Physics , ETH Zürich
https://emeritus.microstructure.ethz.ch/
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From 1975 to 1980 he studied physics at ETH Zurich. He received his doctorate there in 1983 with Prof. Dr. H.C. Siegman. From 1983 to 1986 he was an Oppenheimer Fellow at the University of Cambridge (UK, Prof. Dr. R. F. Willis) and from 1986 to 1990 he was a potdoc at the KFA Jülich (Prof. Dr. M. Campagna). From 1990 to 1992 he was a C3 professor at the RWTH Aachen, until he was appointed associate professor at the ETH Zurich in 1992. In 1995 he was promoted to full professor there. Since 2022 he is emeritus at ETH Zurich.
In his dissertation he dealt with spin-polarized electrons. He developed and used these and similar experimental methods in the further stages of his research work in order to investigate the magnetism of low-dimensional systems and their phase transitions with the highest spatial and temporal resolution. In recognition of his work in this area, he was elected a fellow of the Swiss Academy of Technical Sciences (SATW) in 2018.
"Lectures on quantum mechanics for material scientists".
Abstract.
When speaking of quantum mechanics, one has typically a physics or chemistry student in mind. However, research on materials is now so advanced that students of material science must be trained to understand and above all use those deepest concepts of quantum mechanics that were reserved to physics students in the past. It is along these lines that these lectures discuss the fundamental concepts of modern Quantum Physics such as the failure of classical mechanics, the postulates and mathematical structure of Quantum Physics, the electronic structure of atoms, molecules and solids, the electron spin and time dependent perturbations. The lectures are constructed in such a way that the various concepts are introduced by starting from the explicit and detailed treatment of a simple example. These particular cases are then generalized and put into a ''moderately '' rigorous framework -- the word ''moderately'' meaning that the mathematics is not worked out in details but the essential steps are rigorous enough to withstand practical applications. The present manuscript summarizes the content of the various lectures. The lectures were distributed over a semester at ETH Zurich (about 13 weeks, four hours per week). The course included a set of problems that were intended to complement the lectures themselves with concrete examples and that were solved weekly by the students (one hour per week). Some of the experiments presented contain a link to the site ''Vorlesungsexperimente Departement Physik'' of ETH Zurich. The team that prepared these experimental demonstrations over the years has supported the present lectures with a large amount of experiments that could be performed in-situ and in real time. They also made their work available online. I am grateful to the team for their work in supporting these lectures, in particular, and the entire physics lecture businnes at ETH Zurich.
The knowledge used to prepare these lectures was acquired by reading a large amount of literature on the subject. In particular, I would like to quote the lectures on quantum mechanics held by the late Prof. R. Jost at ETH Zurich during the academic year 1977-1978 and the manuscript by the late Prof. Hunziker. The present lectures show my personal understanding of the subject. This understanding also emerged during the interaction with the many students that frequented my courses. A thank goes also to them.
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