Absolutely Small: How Quantum Theory Explains Our Everyday World

How Quantum Theory Explains Our Everyday World
Erscheinungsjahr 2010
ISBN: 978-0-8144-1488-0
Verlag: McGraw-Hill Education

Buch, Englisch, 288 Seiten, Format (B × H): 62 mm x 90 mm, Gewicht: 2 g

Physics is a complex, even daunting topic, but it is also deeply satisfying even thrilling. And liberated from its mathematical underpinnings, physics suddenly becomes accessible to anyone with the curiosity and imagination to explore its beauty.Science without math? It’s not that unusual. For example, we can understand the concept of gravity without solving a single equation. So for all those who may have pondered what makes blueberries blue and strawberries red; for those who have wondered if sound really travels in waves; and why light behaves so differently from any other phenomenon in the universe, it’s all a matter of quantum physics.Absolutely Small presents (and demystifies) the world of quantum science like no book before. It explores scientific concepts from particles of light, to probability, to states of matter, to what makes greenhouse gases bad in considerable depth, but using examples from the everyday world.Challenging without being intimidating, accessible but not condescending, Absolutely Small develops the reader’s intuition for the very nature of things at their most basic and intriguing levels.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Fayer, Michael D.

Fachgebiete

• Naturwissenschaften Physik Quantenphysik
• Interdisziplinäres Wissenschaften Wissenschaften: Allgemeines

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Contents Preface vii Chapter 1 Schro¨dinger’s Cat 1 Chapter 2 Size Is Absolute 8 Chapter 3 Some Things About Waves 22 Chapter 4 The Photoelectric Effect and Einstein’s Explanation 36 Chapter 5 Light: Waves or Particles? 46 Chapter 6 How Big Is a Photon and the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle 57 Chapter 7 Photons, Electrons, and Baseballs 80 Chapter 8 Quantum Racquetball and the Color of Fruit 96 Chapter 9 The Hydrogen Atom: The History 118 Chapter 10 The Hydrogen Atom: Quantum Theory 130 Chapter 11 Many Electron Atoms and the Periodic Tab le of Elements 151 Chapter 12 The Hydrogen Molecule and the Covalent Bond 178 Chapter 13 What Holds Atoms Together: Diatomic Molecules 196 Chapter 14 Bigger Molecules: The Shapes of Polyatomic Molecules 221 Chapter 15 Beer and Soap 250 Chapter 16 Fat, It’s All About the Double Bonds 272 Chapter 17 Greenhouse Gases 295 Chapter 18 Aromatic Molecules 314 Chapter 19 Metals, Insulators, and Semiconductors 329 Chapter 20 Think Quantum 349 Glossary 363 Index 375

Über Autor(innen)

Michael D. Fayer is the David Mulvane Ehrsam and Edward Curtis Franklin Professor of Chemistry at Stanford University and a member of the National Academy of Sciences. He has won major prizes and honors in the fields of physics, chemistry, and molecular spectroscopy. He is the author of Elements of Quantum Mechanics.