Alfred Mueller

Professor Mueller is a very nice person, but his lectures were impossible to follow. Nearly all of the class time was spent repeating extremely tedious derivations from Griffith's quantum mechanics book, but without any of the motivation. Most lectures involved zero discussion of the actual concepts behind quantum mechanics, instead favoring rote algebra. Professor Mueller would very often skip tons of steps while doing this algebra so that these ridiculous derivations would fit into the class time, so it was really hard to tell exactly what he was trying to show. To make matters worse, he would average about 2 major algebraic errors per class to the point that multiple classes would just end with him saying saying that the end result (which we had just spent the entire lecture on) was wrong, and he would give the corrected version during the next class. It had me wondering what the point of coming to lecture actually was.

Given that the first semester handles primarily the basics of the course, the second semester goes much more into detail of more physical problems like spin, time-dependent perturbation, WKB approximation, adiabatic approximation, Bohr-Sommerfeld, variational principle, etc. Mueller can be a very tough lecturer as he spends the majority of the time doing very thorough and difficult derivations and calculations, but if you consistently attend lecture + do the problem sets when they're assigned, it comes to make a lot of sense. At least in my opinion, quantum mechanics is better understood via the math than trying to build some physical intuition, instead opting to build a mathematical intuition (since that's *far* more trackable). I really enjoyed Mueller, but some folks don't love his style. The most tedious part is when he makes a small mistakes and spends 10 minutes trying to find it. Not every lecture is super coherent until you get to scattering theory.

It is hard to comment this course since your experience hinges on the amount of math you have learned. For those who are good at PDE and special function, Mueller will give you a lot of insights, and you will learn the connection between math and physics (For example, the spherical harmonic series Ylm stands for several electrical models, which are important in QM and classical field.) On the other hand, if you have not learned these things yet, it will be a pain in neck since Mueller won't go through details that he considers trivial, and you will need to read additional materials to improve your understanding. To make the matter worse, he does not have syllabus. However, Mueller is very nice and he is willing to explain everything if you go to his office hour or make appointment with him. The lecture looks crazy and hard at the first place, but most of the content would not appear in the Midterm and Final (Mueller said he did not want it to be algebraic heavy). To be successful in this course, it is better to be familiar with multi-variable calculus (especially integral), some knowledge of PDE, and function expansion.

Griffiths quantum - part 1, followed quite closely. Primarily wavemechanics through to hydrogen atom (though only in its basic sol'n)

the class is very good and you will learn a lot 1 Columbia University: Arts & Sciences Fall 2023 Course: PHYSGR6036_001_2023_3-STATISTICALMECHANICS : PHYSGR6036_001_2023_3 - STATISTICAL MECHANICS Instructor: Hector Ochoa De Eguileor Romillo

Electrostatics, Boundary Value Problems, Magnetostatics, and Magnetic Fields

Mueller is a nice guy, and passionate about the material, but he is getting old, and I dont say that to discount him outright, there are many very coherent and thoughtful older people who teach a columbia, but Mueller makes every lecture so so so hard to follow with his rambling, he also assumes a LOT of backround in quantum which many students did not have. I do not reccomend this class (w mueller) unless it is really necessary

Professor Mueller creates an incredibly comfortable learning environment—always approachable, never dismissive, and genuinely engaged with student questions. His office hours are awesome as well: he often just works through the problem sets with the students. He's also a gracious grader, which is a big plus. Many people (and other reviews) say Mueller isn’t a great lecturer, but people who say that usually don't come to class or pay attention (by week three every semester about half of the class stops coming). His derivations are dense, but if you go to class and pay attention, he sprinkles so many insightful nuggets of wisdom throughout them that really helps elucidate the underlying principle and general consequences of what he's deriving. In his lectures, Muller also pulls from advanced texts like Landau & Lifshitz and Jackson, which is really nice because he breaks down ideas that most of us wouldn’t get through on our own. That said, it's important to read Griffiths concurrently with the lectures. He might not believe in modern technology and write m's like n's (and visa-versa), but Muller is a living legend.

Lots of math, but despite the title of the course, it was taught in a purely mathematical way with little to no conceptual knowledge.

Important mathematical methods and concepts--boundary value problems (laplace), dirac delta functions. In depth overview of electrostatics and magnetostatics.