This is a laboratory course on experimental physics for undergraduate physics majors (414) and graduate students in physics and astronomy (521). The laboratory experiments are located in DRL in rooms 2N23, 2N25, and 2N44. These rooms are open from 9:30am to 6:00pm Monday through Friday and at other times if the student has obtained a key for access. The most important rule to remember about this course is at no time should a student work alone in the laboratory.
Dr. Jose Vithayathil
DRL 2N27
Telephone: 8-3173 (office) or 610 520-2325 (home)
vithayat@physics.upenn.edu
Prof. Joseph Kroll
DRL 3N4A
Telephone: 3-6380 (office) or 215 313 1615 (cell)
kroll@hep.upenn.edu
There will be an initial orientation and organizational meeting on Monday, 9 January 2005 from 5pm to 6:20pm. We will meet at DRL 2C2. Please come promptly at 5pm.
This course does not have regular lectures. We will have a few introductory lectures, probably using the Monday and Wednesday time slot from 5pm to 6:20pm, or we will arrange a common time that works for all the students. These meetings will be used to tour the lab to see the various experiments you may do during the semester, to discuss safety procedures, and to discuss data analysis including a review of the determination of measurement uncertainties.
These introductory lectures (we meet in DRL 2C2) are tentatively scheduled at the following times:
After these initial lectures, we will meet when necessary as a class on Monday from 5-6pm in DRL 2C2 to discuss progress with our labs. These discussions will not occur the weeks that there are oral presentations scheduled. See the schedule in the table below.
The laboratory manual is available as a pdf file or a postscript file.
There is a list of references in the laboratory manual. Some of these texts will be on reserve in the Math/Physics library.
Statistics for Nuclear and Particle Physicists by Louis Lyons is strongly recommended. A few copies of this book are available at the bookstore.
There is one homework assignment (available here) on statistics. Please turn in this assignment with your first lab write-up.
You are expected to do three labs. If you feel you are inexperienced with laboratory work and you would like to make sure the first lab you attempt is straightforward, we recommend you try one of the following experiments:
Of your three experiments, only one should be from the list above. Of the remaining experiments, the gamma ray correlation measurement in 60Ni and the optical pumping of Rubidium vapor are the most challenging.
For each lab you will hand in a lab report and you will make an oral presentation. A description of what is expected in the lab report and the oral presentations can be found here. The schedule for the three labs is shown in the table below. Late lab reports or presentations will have the grade reduced by one half grade, that is, an A will be reduced to a A-, an A- will be reduced to a B+, etc. The first lab report and homework count 15% and the first presentation counts 5% of your grade. The second and third lab reports are 25% each, and the second are third presentations are 15% each of your grade.
You are expected to keep a laboratory notebook that you will use to record your data. Please purchase a "computation notebook" or "labbook" that is 11 3/4 inches by 9 1/4 inches with quadruled paper (the bookstore has these). You will hand in your lab book with your reports. Do not write data on loose pieces of paper and then transcribe these data into your lab book. This practice will be actively discouraged by the instructors.
| Due date | Assignment |
|---|---|
| Tue. Jan. 17 | e-mail instructors choice of 1st lab & partner |
| Fri. Jan. 27 | 1st lab rough draft & homework |
| Tue.,Wed. Jan 31, Feb. 1 | 1st presentation |
| Mon. Feb. 6 | 1st lab final version |
| Fri. Feb. 24 | 2nd lab rough draft |
| Tue.,Wed. Feb. 28, Mar. 1 | 2nd presentation |
| Mon. Mar. 13 | 2nd lab final version |
| Fri. Apr. 7 | 3rd lab rough draft |
| Tue.,Wed. Apr. 11,12 | 3rd presentation |
| Mon. Apr. 17 | 3rd lab final version |
| Apr. 21 | Last Day of Classes |
You are encouraged to do the first lab with a partner. For the second lab, you may work alone, or with a partner. The third lab, however, must be a solo effort. For labs done with a partner, you will hand in a joint lab report, and you will make individual presentations on the laboratory.
The lab reports should be written the style of a research article at a level accessible to upper division physics majors.