This course gives an introduction to the Bardeen-Cooper-Schrieffer theory of superconductivity.
Course content:
Fundamental propreties of superconductors
Magnetic properties of type-I superconductors
Magnetic properties of type-II superconductors
Microscopic BCS theory: Variational approach
Microscopic BCS theory: Bogoliubov-de Gennes equation
Flux quantization and Josephson effect
Landau-Ginzburg theory
Superconductor proximity effect
Topological superconductors
Registration
Please register for this course independently via campus management and via whiteboard. The campus management registration is important to get your credit at the end of the semester. The whiteboard registration is necessary to have access to the course materials and to hand in your completed homework assignments.
If you are unfamiliar with the whiteboard system: Go to https://mycampus.imp.fu-berlin.de/portal, select English as your language, click on membership on the far left of the screen, then on joinable sites below the green horizontal bar, and then select the bcs theory of superconductivity course and click the join button.
I'll send everyone who registers via whiteboard an invitation to join the discussion room at https://meet.physik.fu-berlin.de. If you accept that invitation, you'll have access to a chat group and to a video conference. For the video conference, click the Jitsi Video Conference symbol on the top of the page. To participate in the first online meeting on March 20th it is essential that you register on whiteboard before Monday morning at 10am, so that I can invite you to the online meeting. Note: if you have trouble running the Jitsi system on firefox, it may be helpful to try running it on chrome.
You can participate in the course and obtain credit also if you do not attend the online meetings, but the online meetings may be the easiest way to get answers to any questions you may have!
Course materials:
Lecture notes will be available via whiteboard under resources.
Under resources there will also be a narrated slide show that accompanies the lecture notes. The narrated slide show is in .ppsx format. Under windows you can view it using Microsoft's free PowerPoint Viewer. Under linux you can view it, e.g., using libre office.
Textbook: P.G. de gennes, Superconductivity of Metals and Alloys, available as e-book at the FU library.
Weekly assignments will be posted at whiteboard under assignments. You should also use whiteboard to hand in your completed homework assignments.
Virtual meeting times:
The originally reserved times for this course are Mondays 14-16 and 16-18, for lectures and tutorial, respectively. The first online meeting using the jitsi video conference and/or the chat at meet.physik.fu-berlin.de will be on March 20th at 14.15. There we will discuss the option to replace the two two-hour meetings on Monday with two one-hour meetings on Monday and two one-hour meetings at a different day of the week.
Professor:
Piet Brouwer, Arnimallee 14, 1.4.19, 53039,
brouwer at physik.fu-berlin.de.
Teaching Assistant:
Tommy Li.
Prerequisites:
B.Sc.-level courses in solid state physics, electrodynamics, and thermodynamics and statistical physics.
M.Sc.-level course in quantum mechanics, including the second quantization formalism.
Course credit:
You need to obtain at least 50% score on the homework assignments and to pass the exam at the end of the semester. Details about the time and the form of the exam will be announced later.