Statistical physics (Q5891670)

The book is mainly based on lecture courses on statistical physics that were taught by the author at the physical faculty of the Ural State University in Ekaterinburg since 1992. The courses were intended for all physics students. Therefore the material presented in this book contains the necessary minimum of knowledge of statistical mechanics. A minimum which seems to be necessary for those who wish to have a general education in statistical physics.NEWLINENEWLINE Because statistical physics is not a new scientific discipline, the amount of different aspects that are a part of it is very wide and generally there is the problem of which basic and important concepts should be presented. The situation is more difficult than it seems, because many principles of statistical physics are connected giving a quite complicated picture -- there is another problem: what order of presentation of the principles should be chosen? There is no simple answer to these questions. But there is one rule that can be observed quite often: before we can show some more extended applications we are forced to present basic cases. The author of this book is devoted to the classical approach in statistical physics (usually related to equilibrium physics) -- the presentation is given in such a way that reader with basic knowledge about this field can understand many of the presented aspects.NEWLINENEWLINEIn successive chapters, all basic and advanced topics related to statistics and its applications in mechanics are presented starting from the basics of statistics and Gibbs distribution, through examples of ideal gases, condensed matter and finishing on more complicated aspects like fluctuations, phase transitions and critical phenomena.NEWLINENEWLINEThe book is divided into 11 chapters and there are two appendices for example with a very good explanation of Maxwell's demon paradox. It is a pity that there are not more pictures like Figure 2.1 or Figure B.1 in this book, because they introduce a little bit of humor to this interesting and serious topic.NEWLINENEWLINEThis book is worth to be recommended.