MAT257 Analysis II, University of Toronto 2005-06
 

APM 351 Differential Equations of Mathematical Physics

Almut Burchard, Instructor

Tentative schedule, 2009-10

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Week

Monday

Wednesday

Friday

Sep 7-11 Labour day. What is a PDE? First order linear equations.
Weekly summary
Sep 14-18 Flows, vibrations, and diffusions. Initial and boundary conditions.
Well-posed problems.
Applying the method of characteristics.
Assignment 1
Sep 21-25 The wave equation. D'Alembert's formula.
Causality and energy.
Weekly summary
Sep 28-Oct 2 The diffusion equation. Energy methods
The maximum principle.
The fundamental solution.
Assignment 2
Oct 5-9 Diffusion on the half-line. Reflections of waves. Diffusion and waves with a source.
Weekly summary
Oct 12-16 Thanksgiving. Proof that the representation formulas
solve the heat and wave equation.
Separation of variables.
Assignment 3
Oct 19-23 Eigenfunctions. Fourier sine and cosine series.
Orthogonality in L^2
Full Fourier series for periodic functions.
Oct 26-30 Orthonormal bases. Mean square convergence
and completeness of L^2.
Uniform convergence of Fourier series.
Assignment 4
Nov 2-6 How to integrate or differentiate
a Fourier series.
Inhomogeneous boundary conditions. Laplace's equation.
Harmonic functions.
Nov 9-13 Rectangles and cubes. Poisson's formula.
Assignment 5
Fall break.
Nov 16-20 No class.
(To be rescheduled).
Proof of Poisson's formula Proof of Poisson's formuls.
Nov 23-27 Green's identities. Mean value property.
Announcement of 1st midterm test.
First Midterm Test. Green's functions.
Nov 30-Dec 4
Green's function of the half-space. Green's function of the sphere. More properties of Green's functions.
Dec 9
-Jan 3
Exam period.
Winter break.
Exam period.
Winter break.
Exam period.
Winter break.
Jan 4-8
The wave equation in space-time.
Causality and energy.
Spherical means and the
Euler-Posson-Darboux equation.
Kirchhoff's formula in 3-d.
Huygen's principle.
Jan 11-15 Poisson's formula in 2-d. Rays, singularities, and sources.
Assignment 6
Characteristic surfaces.
Propagation of singularities.
Jan 18-22 Heat and Schrödinger equations
on the whole space.
Hermite polyomials. Radial eigenfunctions of the hydrogen atom.
Assignment 7
Jan 25-29 Nodes. Bessel functions.
Minimax characterization.
The hydrogen atom.
Fourier's method, revisited.
Spherical Harmonics
Summary
Feb. 1-5 Non-radial eigenfunctions
of the hydrogen atom.
General eigenvalue problems.
Rayleigh quotient.
Existence of minimizers.
Assignment 8
Feb 8-11 Minimax principle.
Neumann problem.
Eigenvalue asymptotics. Completeness.
Feb 15-19 Spring break. Spring break. Spring break.
Feb 8-11 Distributions. Green's functions, revisited. Fourier transforms.
Feb 22-26 More about Fourier transforms. Source functions. Laplace transform techniques.
Mar 1-5 Electromagnetism. Fluids and Acoustics. Scattering.
Mar 8-12 Some spectral theory. Continuous spectrum. Equations of elementary particles.
Mar 15-19 Calculus of Variations. Euler-Lagrange equations. Existence of solutions.
Mar 22-26 Shock waves. Solitons. Bifurcation theory.
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