Quantum Mechanics GRE
Posted: Wed Jun 01, 2011 8:28 am
Hey guys,
The quantum prep so far I've encountered has been less than sufficient, and there seem to be very few problems in the QM dept. that can be accomplished in 2 minutes or less, unless it's qualitative. Let's say I pull out my trusty intro to QM griffiths book, what sections are relevant. Should I be knowing the radial part/angular part of wave functions and memorizing all the Y00, Y01, etc. combinations (I'm being specific here since I encountered a question requiring this knowledge in the purple book)? We only really went up to ch 4 (right before the hydrogen atom), but most questions I ever remember doing are pages long....
Or should I maybe just focus on chapter 2, memorize all the important results, skipping the derivations (I know I know, to be a physicist you should understand these derivations, I'm just talking about prep for the GRE where speed is key) and memorizing the results for free particle, ISW, FSW, etc? Would Formalism be relevant?
Any feedback would be really helpful.
Ari
The quantum prep so far I've encountered has been less than sufficient, and there seem to be very few problems in the QM dept. that can be accomplished in 2 minutes or less, unless it's qualitative. Let's say I pull out my trusty intro to QM griffiths book, what sections are relevant. Should I be knowing the radial part/angular part of wave functions and memorizing all the Y00, Y01, etc. combinations (I'm being specific here since I encountered a question requiring this knowledge in the purple book)? We only really went up to ch 4 (right before the hydrogen atom), but most questions I ever remember doing are pages long....
Or should I maybe just focus on chapter 2, memorize all the important results, skipping the derivations (I know I know, to be a physicist you should understand these derivations, I'm just talking about prep for the GRE where speed is key) and memorizing the results for free particle, ISW, FSW, etc? Would Formalism be relevant?
Any feedback would be really helpful.
Ari