A student’s guide to Maxwell’s equations
Author: Daniel Fleisch
Publisher: Cambridge University Press, 2008
Call number: QC670.F596, Lee Wee Nam Library, (Level 4), Science Collection

Maxwell’s Equations are four of the most influential equations in science: Gauss’s law for electric fields, Gauss’s law for magnetic fields, Faraday’s law, and the Ampere-Maxwell law. In this guide for students, each equation is the subject of an entire chapter, with detailed, plain-language explanations of the physical meaning of each symbol in the equation, for both the integral and differential forms. The final chapter shows how Maxwell’s Equations may be combined to produce the wave equation, the basis for the electromagnetic theory of light.

Cover image & summary from Syndetics Solutions, Inc.

The strangest man : the hidden life of Paul Dirac, quantum genius
Author: Graham Farmelo
Publisher: Faber, 2009
Call number: QC16.D57F233, Lee Wee Nam Library, (Level 4), Science Collection

“Fascinating reading… Graham Farmelo has done a splendid job of portraying Dirac and his world. The biography is a major achievement.” -Peter Higgs, Times (UK)

“A page-turner… [Farmelo] has a briliant style, explaining advanced theoretical concepts in phyiscs extremely clearly… sparkling and racy. He is entertaining and has a wry sense of humor, so the book will appeal to a very wide readership.” – Jocelyn Bell-Burnell, Times Higher Education (UK)

“A must-read for anyone interested in the extraordinary power of pure thought. With this revelatory, moving and definitive biography, Graham Farmelo provides the first real glimpse inside the bizarre mind of Paul Dirac.” -Roger Highfield, Editor, New Scientist

“[A] meticulously researched and wonderfully humane biography… Farmelo succeeds triumphantly in elucidating for non-scientists the immediate impact and lasting significance of Dirac’s discoveries.” -Sunday Telegraph

“In the group portrait of genius in 20th century physics, Paul Dirac is the stick figure. Who was he, and what did he do? For all non-physicists who have followed the greatest intellectual adventure of modern times, this is the missing book.” -Tom Stoppard

“Fascinating… [A] suberb book.” -John Gribbin, Literary Review

 Cover image from Amazon, reviews from back cover

Three physicists shared the 2009 Nobel Prize in Physics.

Half of the prize goes to

Charles K. Kao
Standard Telecommunication Laboratories, Harlow, UK, and Chinese University of Hong Kong

“for groundbreaking achievements concerning the transmission of light in fibers for optical communication”

and the other half jointly to

Willard S. Boyle and George E. Smith
Bell Laboratories, Murray Hill, NJ, USA

“for the invention of an imaging semiconductor circuit – the CCD sensor”.

You can read more at 2009 Physics Nobel Prize Resources (by American Institute of Physics).

The University of Nottingham has created a collection of videos on sixty symbols (or concepts) commonly used in physics and astronomy. The project is known as Sixty Symbols.  The videos are not lectures, they are chats with the experts from the university . It also promises to have another sixty symbols coming soon.

Discover our Digital Treasures at our e-Resource Fair.

Date: 12 – 13 Oct 2009
Time: 10.30 am – 5 pm
Venue: In front of LT 1A

Visit us at our Science booth!

Take part in the Knovel University Challenge Contest to win: Amazon Kindle, Nintendo Wiis, iPod Nanos, and iTunes Gift Cards. Search for the answers at Knovel and enter the contest. The closing date for the contest is 1 December 2009.

Lee Wee Nam Library Extended Hours (20 Oct – 7 Dec 2009)
Mon – Fri:   8.30am to 11.30pm
Sat:                8.30am to 7.00pm
Sun:               9.30am to 4.30pm
Closed on public holidays (Hari Raya Haji 27 Nov)

Lee Wee Nam Library Level 5 opening hours (20 Oct – 7 Dec 2009)
Mon – Fri:   8:40am – 11:00pm
Sat:                8.40am – 6.30pm
Sun:               9.40am – 4.00pm
Level 5 will close half an hour before the Library’s closing time. 

LWN Library reverts back to 9.30pm closing on 8 Dec 2009.