5 comments about Semiconductor Devices.

1. this book is not good for students that are going to be tested on the material and the reson is you have no way of knowing if the solutions found for the problems are correct or not, now this may not be important for sombody who's only seeking some extra knowledg. however for students hwo are going to be tested on the materiel, this book may not be convinient. when solving problems one may feel like shooting in the dark.....



2. this book is not good for students that are going to be tested on the material and the reson is you have no way of knowing if the solutions found for the problems are correct or not, now this may not be important for sombody who's only seeking some extra knowledg. however for students hwo are going to be tested on the materiel, this book may not be convinient. when solving problems one may feel like shooting in the dark.....



3. The qualitative analysis done in the book is excellent. However, there are not enough example to re-enforce the theory. When doing problems, I find them difficult to start. Also, many of the homework problems are similar, there can be different types of problems.



4. This excellent introductory book provides a clear presentation about the field of semiconductors devices. The author not only has great efforts to make the material easy to understand but also has been careful to avoid compromising the accuracy and thoroughness of the material for which an understanding of the basic quantum mechanical concepts is necessary.



5. I had the pleasure of studying under Dr. Kano at Syracuse University. He was the absolute *BEST* professor in the EE program. This book puts into text all that he taught... invaluable. I have worked in VLSI/DSM circuit design for the last 10 years and find this book a great resource to have on the desk.

1 comments about Magnetism in Condensed Matter (Oxford Maser Series in Condensed Matter Physics).

1. This book is an easy to read overview of the subject. It's a good book to review the fundamentals (para/dia/ferro/anti magnetism,
   exchange interaction, etc.). I gave it 4 stars instead of 5 because the price is a bit high, and sometimes the treatments lacks depth.

4 comments about Fundamentals of Semiconductors: Physics and Materials Properties.

1. This is an excellent book on all properties of semiconductors -electronic structure , phonons , transport and optics . It primarilyfocusses on bulk properties ,but extremely succinct and relevant comments on hetersotructures can also be found interspersed throughout .

   Many books on semiconductor physics err on the side of breadth at the expense of depth . I found this book to be a pleasant exception . I believe this leaves other similar books like Physics of Semiconductors and their Heterostructures by J.Singh far behind .

   Cardona (of course) is at his best when discussing otical properties , especially optical diagnostic methods . I have not seen a similar book at this level which gives the same level of description of light-matter interaction in semiconductors.

   I recommend it highly to all fellow graduate students .




2. The third edition is already available. The second is OUT OF PRINT. ENTRY SHOULD BE UPDATED



3. I'm a Ph.D on physics, I read this book from page to page and worked out the problems.
   This is an excellent book on the physics of semiconductors, NOT on semiconductor devices! The text is well written. The physical concept is clearly explained, mostly with a diagram or a graph. The formulae are carefully deducted without wasting too much time and space. I must add a few words on the problems. From all the physics textbooks I've read, only Claude Cohen-Tannoudji's Quantum Mechanics book is comparable. Those problems usually are about the the formulae, such as k.p. perturbation method and Luttinger Hamiltonian, etc., appeared in the main text but its detail is not appropriate there. The problems are by no means easy. Actually, some of them are really hard. For example, it took me a lot of time to work out the 6 by 6 k.p. perturbation matrix! In the process of working out those problems, I had a better understanding on the computational physics. You don't see that in a normal textbook!

   The references are the classical or landstone papers about a specific subject, very good for further research.

   In summary, this is an excellent textbook, if you want to study it hard.




4. This book is an excellent reference book on semiconductors in general. The physics behind semiconductor theory is discussed very well, however, if you are looking for a book regarding semiconductor devices or electronics, this is not what you are looking for.
   
   One advantage of this book is that it contains a fairly large section for "group theory", if you are using it in your studies.
   
   Electronic, transport and especially optical properties of semiconductors are mentioned very extensively and clearly. There is also a whole chapter on photoemission, which is very useful. The concept of quantum confinement is addressed independently with illustrative examples.
   
   If you are interested in semiconductors and want to buy "one" book which you can use and consult all the time, this is the book you need. The authors are some of the best in the World on semiconductors.

1 comments about An Introduction to Random Vibrations, Spectral & Wavelet Analysis: Third Edition.

1. I got it when this one is on sale at $2.99 plus shipping.
   So I did not expect much from it; however, after I browsed for a while, it turned out to be one of the great books I own.
   It introduces this topic in the straightforward fashion along with good examples and make everything less difficult than supposed to be.
   
   I would recommend this book to any neophyte in this area.
   Even not on-sale, only $20 can not be beaten.
   
   Also note that everything in this edition is exactly the same as the hardcover one costing more than $100.

3 comments about Many Particle Physics (Physics of Solids and Liquids).

1. Un excellent livre sur un sujet d'actualite. G. Mahan discute de nombreuses en detaillant a chaque fois les etapes necessaires et en ne negligeant pas les explications ni les liens entre les differentes theories. Vu le prix, courez a votre bibliotheque pour vous le procurer!



2. Unfortunately, the 3rd edition of Mahan's book contains enormous number of misprints. Sometimes, it is impossible to understand what is meant by the author without consulting the previous edition. For example, in Sec. 4.1.5. the author refers in the text to the equation which apparently should be between Eqs. (4.126) and (4.127) but which had been omitted. At the same time, some evident drawbacks of the previous edition have not been corrected. For example, the definition of the thermodynamic average used in Sec. 3.6 is different from that used in the previous sections, although it is not mentioned in the text. Despite the book is an excellent introduction into the field of Many-Particle Physics, I would recommend to the customer to either buy the previous edition or to wait for a new one.



3. This book is massive and covers a huge spectrum of material. Probably not cost effective in comparison to Fetter and Walecka unless you get it for under eighty bucks. I enjoyed it quite a bit until the Postal Service stole it from me.

5 comments about Solid State Physics: Problems and Solutions.

1. This book offers a nice set of pretty standard undergraduate to first year graduate problems in solid state physics. The answers, unfortunately, are sloppy and remarkably lack the detail you would expect from a question and answer book. Each chapter has a superficial and not too insightful introduction to the topic before asking the questions. Probably, most disappointing are the problems for which there are no answers. Isn't this supposed to be a problem and answer book? If you are looking for an insightful solution guide or a general overview as a companion for an introductory solid state course, you don't want this book. If you just want to see a result and have some stuff to jot down on homework assignments, then perhaps this book is just what you need.



2. One rarely comes across a book, about which one can say without any qualifying adjective, that it is simply great. The book of Mihaly and Martin however does belong in this rarefied category.

   As anyone teaching solid state physics knows from experience, it is always demanding to find quality examples. The problems in the previous standard books are unfortunately dated, often decades back. In contrast, Mihaly and Martin bring examples from the very latest developments in solid state physics. At the same time they find room for covering the actual workings of such must-know experimental apparatii, as the triple axis spectrometer and the Fourier transform infrared spectrometer. It is hard to find books, which adress the theoretical and experimental sides of our discipline with such balance.

   When the authors cover more conventional topics, like symmetries and band structures, they make them exciting for the student by chosing fascinating applications, for instance lattices of fullerenes instead of sodium. When they cover modern areas, they devote space extensively, very much unlike similar treatises. These include optical properties, correlation effects in infinite and low dimensional models, and phase transitions in electronic systems.

   The best recommendation goes beyond words; it is reflected in actions: I already adopted the book in my course, and the students cannot get enough of these inventive problems. They actually like solving the homework problems, a true satisfaction for any teacher.




3. One rarely comes across a book, about which one can say without any qualifying adjective, that it is simply great. The book of Mihaly and Martin however does belong in this rarefied category.

   As anyone teaching solid state physics knows from experience, it is always demanding to find quality examples. The problems in the previous standard books are unfortunately dated, often decades back. In contrast, Mihaly and Martin bring examples from the very latest developments in solid state physics. At the same time they find room for covering the actual workings of such must-know experimental apparatii, as the triple axis spectrometer and the Fourier transform infrared spectrometer. It is hard to find books, which adress the theoretical and experimental sides of our discipline with such balance.

   When the authors cover more conventional topics, like symmetries and band structures, they make them exciting for the student by chosing fascinating applications, for instance lattices of fullerenes instead of sodium. When they cover modern areas, they devote space extensively, very much unlike similar treatises. These include optical properties, correlation effects in infinite and low dimensional models, and phase transitions in electronic systems.

   The best recommendation goes beyond words; it is reflected in actions: I already adopted the book in my course, and the students cannot get enough of these inventive problems. They actually like solving the homework problems, a true satisfaction for any teacher.




4. This book compiles a large number of problems in SSP (included solutions to the problems as well). It could certainly be used as a supplement for a first course in SSP very effectively.



5. This problems and solutions in solid state physics book leaves much freedom and autonomy to the reader. The expositions of the many problems this book contains are generally short and cover a wide range of solid state physics notions. Much more instructive than Kittel's or Ashcroft and Mermin's exercises set.

3 comments about Elasticity (Solid Mechanics and Its Applications).

1. This book will introduce governing equations of linear elasticity and will focus on solutions of boundary value problems in both two and three dimensions using several different methods.



2. Unfortunately, Barber's Elasticity is marred by a good deal of errata and does not make clear important assumptions in several derivations, most notably in dealing with curved beams. There are better texts available on this subject.



3. This is a superb graduate level textbook on linear elasticity, by an author well-recognized for his own research on this topic. Please notice that the 2nd edition of the book is greatly expanded and improved from the 1st edition. Elasticity is a "classic" subject of advanced mechanics education, and the older classic books by Timoshenko and Sokolnikoff take the subject to the mid-20th century. Since then, however, important "broad" solutions have been added, such as singular stresses in cracks/dislocations/disclinations, or micromechanics-type of problems dealing with inhomogeneities and transformation strains in the spirit of Eshelby. Beyond that, symbolic math packages now allow the instruction of elasticity in a very different manner from, say, 15 years ago. Barber has written his book in a way that allows, I believe, this easy incorporation of symbolic math packages into the course material.
   
   We have used Barber's book three times for teaching a graduate course on elasticity, and the students (both MS and PhD levels) have found the book lucid and succinct. It contains a good number of homework problems, ranging from easier to quite challenging. A very attractive feature of the book is that a complete, detailed solution manual is available to instructors (from the author at the Univ. of Michigan.) A very extensive list of symbolic math files for computation of stresses and displacements from 2-D and 3-D potentials is also available from the author.
   
   Contrary to other books on elasticity, Barber's book does not devote too much space on tensor analysis in the beginning. Students are most likely exposed to these tools in a course on continuum mechanics. I like this approach (Timoshenko follows the same view in his classic monograph), since it allows the instructor to jump right into solving elasticity problems.
   
   One advantage of the book is its modern approach: There are chapters on crack-tip singular stresses, and dislocations. The standard material on 2-D problems are presented both in rectangular and polar coordinates. Barber has a beautiful discussion on generating independent solutions of the biharmonic equation that is clear and presented from first principles. The discussion of the St. Venant assumption in the context of the cantilever loaded by a shear force at its end is also an educational gem, combining the solution of the half-plane loaded by sinusoidal tractions with an estimate of the decay rate of the equilibrated "corrective" tractions. The discussion of the Williams singular stresses in the wedge and in the crack limit is also highly educational, one of the best I have seen in a textbook.
   
   The 3-D presentation is also well written. This topic may seem incomprehensible and arbitrary to many beginning grad students, but Barber starts from simple solutions (Lame potential) and then proceeds to more involved potentials (solving biharmonic equations, i.e. Love, Galerkin, or harmonic equations, i.e. Papkovich-Neuber). The extension of these ideas to solving half-space problems is presented very systematically (the clearest approach I have seen in a textbook) by building a list of solutions each of which identifies a specific type of traction that is easily made to vanish at the half-space boundary. There is also a well-written section on sphere problems using spherical harmonics, on the complex variable formulation of 2-D problems, as well as on thermal stresses.
   
   The contact section is also well written. The presentation of 2-D contact is systematic and very educational, hinging on the use of Fourier analysis and the half-plane point force solutions to solve contact with flat punches and cylinders.
   
   A useful educational feature of the 2-D section is a feature that many instructors will find attractive: A list of all the biharmonic solutions in terms of polynomial or polar coordinate functions, including both stresses and displacements. Students love these tables: They allow the quick "building"of solutions by inspection.
   
   In summary, this is a well-written textbook, greatly recommended for an advanced undergrad and certainly for a grad-level course on elasticity. I would love to see a greater number of problems, both medium and more challenging, and, perhaps, an expanded section on energy principles, mostly minimum potential energy.

4 comments about Quantum Optics: An Introduction (Oxford Master Series in Physics, 6).

1. I developed an interest in quantum optics in my last year of undergraduate school but I became discouraged with it since every book that I picked up on the subject was esoteric and too involved for an introduction. It seemed as if NONE of the quantum optics textbooks available were appropriate as an introduction. But then I found this book.
   
   Although not as mathematically intensive as I was hoping for it to be, it explains the physics very well. And although it doesn't compensate for many years of post-graduate study, I was able to better understand research papers in quantum optics due to this book.
   
   The book follows a rather traditional approach to developing quantum optics...first starting off with a discussion of important results in electromagnetism, classical optics, and quantum mechanics...then progressing to the theory of photons (discussing photon statistics, coherent states, and second quantization (with regard to photon number states)). Furthermore, it discusses the essential "backbone" of quantum optics (light-matter interactions) and then applications of quantum optics (quantum computing, quantum entanglement, etc.).
   
   I broke the rules and skipped ahead to the applications section and I must say that everything seems to make sense because of Fox's ability to convey difficult ideas in a simple, easy-to-understand manner.
   
   For anybody just starting to take an interest in quantum optics (like I was at one point), I would strongly suggest this book. It's not as mathematically sophisticated as Loudon's "The Quantum Theory of Light" (which is another must-have for quantum optics), but it's an excellent introduction.



2. At last we have a text that provides a comprehensive introduction to quantum optics for the beginner - both theory and experiment - and one which takes you through many of the most recent concepts and potential applications in computation, cryptography and teleportation etc.
   
   A feature of this text is the clear explanations and carefully explained jargon - it's NOT just mostly a collection of math like some other supposedly introductory texts.
   
   If you want to find out what quantum optics is all about - this is a great book to start with.



3. This is our textbook and is easy to understand. It also has answers for the exercise questions. That helps a lot.



4. Fox does a great job explaining a complex and dense field from an intuitive and experimental standpoint. I read this book after one term of 1-D introductory Q.M. and everything made sense. The experiments and set-ups described throughout the book are a great tool and were particularly handy since I was using the book to get ready for a summer internship in a Quantum Optics group. The only downside is that the book is quite lacking from a theoretical standpoint. If you are a bit more comfortable with Q.M., say at the level of Shankar, Liboff, or Sakuri, try Knight instead. Nonetheless, this is a great book.

5 comments about Vibrations and Waves (Mit Introductory Physics Series).

1. This is a terrific book. It would benefit slightly from incorporating matrices in one part of the text, but given the level of student it's geared toward, that's not a fatal omission. French's style is clear and thorough. I am a fan of all his books, and have no qualms recommending this one.



2. I used this book instead of the originally assigned text (H.J. Pain's truly awful "Physics of Vibrations and Waves") in a class I took recently. It was a pleasure to read.
   
   In spite of the fact that the book is quite short (and quite compact in your bag), it covers the material very thoroughly. The author writes clearly and with a lot of attention to the needs of the student. French's style is also very lively and makes you want to read on instead of feeling you are obligated to. The problems at the end of each chapter are excellent. It is also inexpensive.
   
   All in all, quite a gem in this day of boring, incomprehensible, too-heavy-to-carry $120 textbooks that arrive in a "new" less readable edition every year. If only every textbook could be like this.
   
   It isn't quite perfect -- every once in a while a derivation gets obscure and a few topics aren't covered -- but it is very, very good. I highly recommend it.



3. I recently took a class on Vibrations and Waves and the professor ended up using this book mainly for the course. It was somewhat difficult to read through and the material in the book often has little to do with the actual practice problems. Also, there are no examples and many of the chapters refuse to go into important detail of some topics, assuming the reader to know a good deal.



4. The book gives a good introduction to the concept of waves, beginning with vibrational modes of coupled oscillators of springs and strings. However, it neglects analysis of Electromagnetic waves that I feel are not a far cry from the topics presented. I also think that more information could be given on dispersion, mediums, and boundary reflections and transmissions.



5. Short Review:
   The photos and plots in this book are exemplary. They complement the material perfectly, building up intuitional understanding of the phenomena at the same time the text allows you to handle the physics mathematically.
   Each chapter follows logically. Everything builds up step by step from the most basic case of a simple harmonic oscillator, and the book has a feeling of progression that encouraged me to keep going. Every chapter brought new understanding to things I vaguely knew about, but was fuzzy on quite why it was that way.
   Although the basic systems discussed are pendulums, masses-on-springs, and linear strings, the text also contains plenty of information on how the theory built by examining these simple systems can apply to many other places where the same differential equations apply - especially electric circuits, but also acoustics.
   Vibrations and Waves does a superb job as a concise and clear introduction to how wave phenomena work.
   
   Longer Review:
   I recently read this book as review while preparing for a more advanced class on quantum mechanics (a theory about waves). I had previously taken a course on vibrations and waves using the (out of print) text by Crawford. Although Crawford's book is probably good, I never read the text carefully though because it was monstrously long.
   
   French presented itself as friendly and readable, without bogging me down in unnecessary detail. It turned out to be exactly that. The chapters were short enough I could read them in one sitting. The problems varied from straightforward applications of what was already stated in the text to ones that made me think for a while, without being so overbearing as to waste my time or become unduly frustrating. There are also answers printed in the back of the book - in my opinion absolutely essential for any book to be used for self-study.
   
   I actually enjoyed reading Vibrations and Waves, which is not the norm for reading physics texts, at least for me. The photos were gorgeous. They were black and white, and not fancy, but the experimental setup used to get the photos was often both clever and instructive. Just when it got difficult to understand just what the equations were saying, there was a picture to demonstrate the system's response. The Lissajous figures and pictures of nodal lines of 2-D surfaces were interesting enough to be worth looking at in their own right.
   
   After reading this book, I feel like I have a much firmer understanding of coupled oscillators and coupled differential equations, the wave equation, refraction, diffraction, and other boundary effects, which were all things I knew enough about to be able to describe, roughly, but not enough about to claim a useful comprehension of the subject.
   The introduction of complex numbers and the complex exponential is truly masterful.
   
   I would like to have the time to read French's other introductory physics books, but even if I don't I'll remain glad to have read this one.

2 comments about Wave Motion in Elastic Solids.

1. This book is great. This book describes the full theory of wave motions in elastic solids. Great mathematical descriptions and interpretations. Good derivations of equations of motion and their assumptions. This book is a masterwork and an awesome referencebook for everything that has to do with waves!



2. Whenever I have a question about core acoustical problems or find a reference to give to colleagues or students, it is Graff's old but great "Wave Motion in Elastic Solids" I end up using or recommending by far the most. This book is a rare treat for it's clarity, the material it covers and the derivation it contains. The book does things right in terms presentation. It does not leave important core derivations as exercise but presents them fully throughout the book. While exercises are present they are not needed to find material but do illustrate important concepts. The mathematical language is that of engineering mathematics that is still mostly typical today. My only critique is that alternative and more modern ways to arrive at certain derivations are missing (for example deriving the fundamental solution of the wave equation in the plane using distributions rather than through Hankel transforms or a treatment of the method of descend to relate wave equations of different dimensions). But this is a minor critique because the book at least contains comprehensive treatment of the Hankel transform path, while it is hard to find it in many other acoustics books of comparable level. In general a lot of concepts are derived and explained in unusual clarity and misconceptions about the applicability of certain methods beyond its realm is often not only avoided but also explained.
   
   To cover the missing ground of treatment of the wave equation in terms of distributions and a nice and easy treatment of the method of descend I'd recommend Stein and Shakarchi's recent, very accessible and overall just excellent "Fourier Analysis", Princeton University Press, 2003.
   
   Anybody that looks for a quality reference for acoustics, this is a real catch and if one wants to buy just one reference, this may well be the best one to get despite its age. Given its clarity it certainly is suitable for self-study.