Avijit Lahiri - Statistical Mechanics

Avijit Lahiri

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Universities Press (India) Private Limited 2002, 2008
First published 2002
Revised edition 2008

eISBN 978 81 7371 843 4

e-edition:First Published 2013

ePUB Conversion: .

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List of Titled Problems

Preface to the First Revised Edition

In this first revision of the book, I have included a few sections so as to make the presentation more precise and solidly founded while at the same time retaining its informal flavour as also the elementary level of approach to the subject. In contrast to the previous edition, I have made use of classical mechanics as the launching pad for developing the basic notions of statistical mechanics and have then completed the development by underlining the essential role of quantum theory as the founding ground of the subject. I have corrected for a certain lack of balance in the earlier presentation by dwelling at length on the concept of the mixed state and of the reduced state of a subsystem, have added a few instructive problems to those in the previous edition, and have corrected a few other errors brought to my notice. I have also included an elementary exposition of the virial expansion, marking the boundary of the material I set out to present.