Drishti IAS

Physics
Syllabus

Delhi Branch
Drishti IAS, 641, Mukherjee Nagar, Opp.
Signature View Apartment, New Delhi

Karol Bagh Branch

Drishti IAS, 21 Pusa Road, Karol Bagh New Delhi - 05

Prayagraj Branch
Drishti IAS, Tashkent Marg, Civil Lines, Prayagraj, Uttar Pradesh

Jaipur Branch
Drishti IAS, Tonk Road, Vasundhra Colony, Jaipur, Rajasthan

E-mail: [email protected], Website: www.drishtiias.com/eng

English General Inquiry: 8750187501
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PAPER-I
(a) Mechanics of Particles
Laws of motion; conservation of energy and momentum, applications to rotating frames, centripetal and
Coriolis accelerations; Motion under a central force; Conservation of angular momentum, Kepler’s laws; Fields
and potentials; Gravitational field and potential due to spherical bodies, Gauss and Poisson equations,
gravitational self-energy; Two-body problem; Reduced mass; Rutherford scattering; Centre of mass and
laboratory reference frames.
(b) Mechanics of Rigid Bodies
System of particles; Centre of mass, angular momentum, equations of motion; Conservation theorems for
energy, momentum and angular momentum; Elastic and inelastic collisions; Rigid Body; Degrees of freedom,
Euler’s theorem, angular velocity, angular momentum, moments of inertia, theorems of parallel and
perpendicular axes, equation of motion for rotation; Molecular rotations (as rigid bodies); Di and tri-atomic
molecules; Precessional motion; top, gyroscope.
(c) Mechanics of Continuous Media
Elasticity, Hooke’s law and elastic constants of isotropic solids and their inter-relation; Streamline (Laminar)
flow, viscosity, Poiseuille’s equation, Bernoulli’s equation, Stokes’ law and applications.
(d) Special Relativity
Michelson-Morely experiment and its implications; Lorentz transformations length contraction, time dilation,
addition of relativistic velocities, aberration and Doppler effect, mass-energy relation, simple applications to
a decay process. Four dimensional momentum vector; Covariance of equations of physics.
Waves and Optics
(a) Waves: Simple harmonic motion, damped oscillation, forced oscillation and resonance; Beats; Stationary
waves in a string; Pulses and wave packets; Phase and group velocities; Reflection and refraction from Huygens’
principle.
(b) Geometrial Optics: Laws of reflection and refraction from Fermat’s principle; Matrix method in paraxial optic-
thin lens formula, nodal planes, system of two thin lenses, chromatic and spherical aberrations.
(c) Interference: Interference of light -Young’s experiment, Newton’s rings, interference by thin films, Michelson
interferometer; Multiple beam interference and Fabry Perot interferometer.
(d) Diffraction: Fraunhofer diffraction - single slit, double slit, diffraction grating, resolving power; Diffraction by
a circular aperture and the Airy pattern; Fresnel diffraction: half-period zones and zone plates, circular aperture.
(e) Polarisation and Modern Optics: Production and detection of linearly and circularly polarized light; Double
refraction, quarter wave plate; Optical activity; Principles of fibre optics, attenuation; Pulse dispersion in step
index and parabolic index fibres; Material dispersion, single mode fibers; Lasers-Einstein A and B coefficients.
Ruby and He-Ne lasers. Characteristics of laser light-spatial and temporal coherence; Focusing of laser beams.
Three-level scheme for laser operation; Holography and simple applications.
Electricity and Magnetism
(a) Electrostatics and Magnetostatics: Laplace and Poisson equations in electrostatics and their applications;
Energy of a system of charges, multipole expansion of scalar potential; Method of images and its applications.
Potential and field due to a dipole, force and torque on a dipole in an external field; Dielectrics, polarisation.
Solutions to boundaryvalue problems-conducting and dielectric spheres in a uniform electric field; Magnetic
shell, uniformly magnetised sphere; Ferromagnetic materials, hysteresis, energy loss.
(b) Current Electricity: Kirchhoff’s laws and their applications. Biot-Savart law, Ampere’s law, Faraday’s law, Lenz’
law. Selfand mutual- inductances; Mean and rms values in AC circuits; DC and AC circuits with R, L and C
components; Series and parallel resonance; Quality factor; Principle of transformer.
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Electromagnetic Waves and Blackbody Radiation

(a) Displacement current and Maxwell’s equations; Wave equations in vacuum, Poynting theorem; Vector and
scalar potentials; Electromagnetic field tensor, covariance of Maxwell’s equations; Wave equations in isotropic
dielectrics, reflection and refraction at the boundary of two dielectrics; Fresnel’s relations; Total internal
reflection; Normal and anomalous dispersion; Rayleigh scattering; Blackbody radiation and Planck ’s radiation
law- Stefan-Boltzmann law, Wien’s displacement law and Rayleigh-Jeans law.

Thermal and Statistical Physics

(a) Thermodynamics: Laws of thermodynamics, reversible and irreversible processes, entropy; Isothermal,
adiabatic, isobaric, isochoric processes and entropy changes; Otto and Diesel engines, Gibbs’ phase rule and
chemical potential; Van der Waals equation of state of a real gas, critical constants; Maxwell-Boltzmann
distribution of molecular velocities, transport phenomena, equipartition and virial theorems; Dulong-Petit,
Einstein, and Debye’s theories of specific heat of solids; Maxwell relations and application; ClausiusClapeyron
equation. Adiabatic demagnetisation, Joule-Kelvin effect and liquefaction of gases.
(b) Statistical Physics: Macro and micro states, statistical distributions, Maxwell-Boltzmann, Bose-Einstein and
Fermi-Dirac Distributions, applications to specific heat of gases and blackbody radiation; Concept of negative
temperatures.

PAPER-II

Quantum Mechanics
1. Wave-particle duality; Schroedinger equation and expectation values; Uncertainty principle; Solutions of the
one-dimensional Schroedinger equation for free particle (Gaussian wave-packet), particle in a box, particle in
a finite well, linear harmonic oscillator; Reflection and transmission by a step potential and by a rectangular
barrier; Particle in a three dimensional box, density of states, free electron theory of metals; Angular
momentum; Hydrogen atom; Spin half particles, properties of Pauli spin matrices.

Atomic and Molecular Physics

1. Stern-Gerlach experiment, electron spin, fine structure of hydrozen atom; L-S coupling, J-J coupling;
2. Spectroscopic notation of atomic states; Zeeman effect; Franck-Condon principle and applications; Elementary
theory of rotational, vibrational and electronic spectra of diatomic molecules; Raman effect and molecular
structure; Laser Raman spectroscopy; Importance of neutral hydrogen atom, molecular hydrogen and molecular
hydrogen ion in astronomy. Fluorescence and Phosphorescence; Elementary theory and applications of NMR
and EPR; Elementary ideas about Lamb shift and its significance.

Nuclear and Particle Physics

1. Basic nuclear properties-size, binding energy, angular momentum, parity, magnetic moment; Semi-empirical
mass formula and applications. Mass parabolas; Ground state of a deuteron, magnetic moment and non-
central forces; Meson theory of nuclear forces; Salient features of nuclear forces; Shell model of the nucleus
- success and limitations; Violation of parity in beta decay; Gamma decay and internal conversion; Elementary
ideas about Mossbauer spectroscopy; Q-value of nuclear reactions; Nuclear fission and fusion, energy
production in stars. Nuclear reactors.
2. Classification of elementary particles and their interactions; Conservation laws; Quark structure of hadrons :
Field quanta of electroweak and strong interactions; Elementary ideas about unification of forces; Physics of
neutrinos.
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Solid State Physics, Devices and Electronics

1. Crystalline and amorphous structure of matter; Different crystal systems, space groups; Methods of
determination of crystal structure; X-ray diffraction, scanning and transmission electron microscopies; Band
theory of solids—conductors, insulators and semi-conductors; Thermal properties of solids, specific heat,
Debye theory; Magnetism: dia, para and ferromagnetism; Elements of super-conductivity, Meissner effect,
Josephson junctions and applications; Elementary ideas about high temperature superconductivity.
2. Intrinsic and extrinsic semi-conductors- p-n-p and n-p-n transistors; Amplifiers and oscillators. Op-amps; FET,
JFET and MOSFET; Digital electronics-Boolean identities, De Morgan’s laws, Logic gates and truth tables. Simple
logic circuits; Thermistors, solar cells; Fundamentals of microprocessors and digital computers.