PHY 317 - Fall 2007 - Bibliography



Note: The following books have been placed on reserve in the Physics Library.

Title

Description
1 A.C.Phillips: The Physics of Stars A very good book; best used if one has already taken a course in modern physics and has already a solid preparation in physics. One might want to supplement this book with background readings using the book mentioned next.
2 D.A.Ostlie, B.W.Carroll: a. An Introduction to Modern Stellar Astrophysics, and
b. Modern Astrophysics 		The first is the textbook; it has nice introductory chapters on the physics used in the course, such as elements of: mechanics. quantum mechanics, interaction of light with matter, nuclear physics, and statistical mechanics, but it lacks depth in certain topics.
The second book is mentioned here because it could be used as a reference for a wider look at astrophysics.
3 D. Prialnik: An Introduction to the Theory of Stellar Structure and Evolution This text is at the level of the course. The main drawback is its lack of introductory chapters for readers not entirely familiar with some of the background material, see above.


Additional general purpose references that are particularly useful (some of these books are on reserve for this or other courses).

Title

Description
1 Halliday, Resnick and Walker: Fundamentals of Physics Classical textbook of general physics with calculus. It might be helpful in order to review topics such as: gravitational law, potential and kinetic energies, electromagnetic waves and spectrum, Coulomb's law, special relativity.
2 C. Kittel, H. Kroemer: Thermal Physics A standard upper undergraduate textbook in thermodynamics and statistical physics. It will be used to introduce: the ideal gas law, blackbody radiation, heat transport, Maxwell-Boltzmann, Fermi-Dirac and Bose-Einstein distributions, etc.
3 M. Seeds, Foundations of Astronomy A typical textbook used in descriptive astronomy courses.
4 Howard S. Goldberg, Michael D. Scadron: Physics of Stellar Evolution and Cosmology This book is at lower level than our textbook; for example, it doesn't use calculus, and thus it cannot go deep into important aspects of stellar astrophysics. On the other hand, it has more extensive coverage of the interstellar medium. It might be useful to get an overview of certain topics covered in PHY317.
5 Kaplan: The Physics of Stars It presents most of what is being covered in PHY317 but at a lower level. At times it might be useful to see how certain topics are introduced in a slightly different way.
6 R. J. Tayler: The Stars: their Structure and Evolution This book covers most of the topics in PHY317 at a comparable level. Sometimes, it contains more detailed explanations about the choice of values of certain parameters, or about the use and extent of validity of certain approximations.
7P.A. Tipler: Modern PhysicsOr any other introductiory text about modern physics

Note: Additional books will be placed on reserve as need arises.