Contemporary physics

This book is the eighth edition of an elementary text on solid state/condensed matter physics for seniors and beginning graduate students of the physical sciences, chemistry, and engineering. In the years since the first edition was published the field has developed ...

This article discusses the concept of information and its intimate relationship with physics. After an introduction of all the necessary quantum mechanical and information theoretical concepts we analyse Landauer's principle which states that the erasure of information is inevitably accompanied by the generation of heat. We employ this principle to rederive a number of results in classical and quantum information theory whose rigorous mathematical derivations are difficult. This demonstrates the usefulness of Landauer's principle and provides an introduction to the physical theory of information.

ABSTRACT This article opens with a brief survey on the effect of conduction electron scattering on the electrical resistance of non-magnetic metals. It then deals at greater length with recent work on the temperature-dependence of resistance of the magnetic rare-earth elements and of some transition metals, and includes several interesting problems which still await solution.

Why did it take us 50 years since the birth of the quantum mechanical formalism to discover that unknown quantum states cannot be cloned? Yet, the proof of the 'no-cloning theorem'is easy, and its consequences and potential for applications are immense. Similarly, why did it take us 60 years to discover the conceptually intriguing and easily derivable physical phenomenon of 'quantum teleportation'? We claim that the quantum mechanical formalism doesn't support our intuition, nor does it elucidate the key concepts that govern the ...

We review current understanding of the non-equilibrium dynamics of collective quantum systems. We describe an approach based on the Hamiltonian formulation of superfluid hydrodynamics. It is shown that, in the presence of constant energy pumping, the nonlinear coupling of fluctuations in the density and entropy strongly affects the nonequilibrium dynamics of the system. We use the results obtained to analyze the properties of out-of-equilibrium superfluid 4He and of exciton polariton Bose-Einstein condensates, both in semiconductor quantum wells and in graphene layers in presence of high magnetic field.