Chronology Current Month Current Thread Current Date
[Year List] [Month List (current year)] [Date Index] [Thread Index] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Date Prev] [Date Next]

RE: B-E Stats



I think teaching Bose-Einstein and Fermi-Dirac statistics in a junior level
stat mech/thermo course is very important.

The recent announcments of observations of Bose-Einstein condensation
potentially eliminates a source of great confusion. Superfluidity and
superconductivity are often cited as examples of Bose-Einstein condensation.
But both involve dense, strongly interacting particles, whereas B-E
condensation theory deals with a non-interacting, ideal gas of particles. So,
while they are not unrelated subjects, neither are they clearly examples of B-E
condensation.

The recent results (sorry not to have a reference handy) are interesting
because the system *is* in the ideal gas limit and this is the first observation
of the textbook theory in action. So maybe we can now change all the textbooks
to refer to these new experiments and carefully segregate superfluidity and
superconductivity into a "this is related to, but not the same as.." section.

Tim Sullivan (sullivan@kenyon.edu)