Intermediate Physics for Medicine and Biology

Abstract

From the Preface to the Third Edition, by Russell K. Hobbie: Between 1971 and 1973 I audited all the courses medical students take in their first 2 years at the University of Minnesota. I was amazed at the amount of physics I found in these courses and how little of it is discussed in the general physics course. I found a great discrepancy between the physics in some papers in the biological research literature and what I knew to be the level of understanding of most biology majors or premed students who have taken a year of physics. It was clear that an intermediate level physics course would help these students. It would provide the physics they need and would relate it directly to the biological problems where it is useful. This book is the result of my having taught such a course since 1973. It is intended to serve as a text for an intermediate course taught in a physics department and taken by a variety of majors. Since its primary content is physics, I hope that physics faculty who might shy away from teaching a conventional biophysics course will consider teaching it. I also hope that research workers in biology and medicine will find it a useful reference to brush up on the physics they need or to find a few pointers to the current literature in a number of areas of biophysics. (The bibliography in each chapter is by no means exhaustive; however, the references should lead you quickly into a field.) The course offered at the University of Minnesota is taken by undergraduates in a number of majors who want to see more physics with biological applications and by graduate students in physics, biophysical sciences, biomedical engineering, physiology, and cell biology. Because the book is intended primarily for students who have taken only one year of physics, I have tried to adhere to the following principles in writing it: 1. Calculus is used without apology. When an important idea in calculus is used for the first time, it is reviewed in detail. These reviews are found in the appendices. 2. The reader is assumed to have taken physics and know the basic vocabulary. However, I have tried to present a logical development from first principles, but shorter than what would be found in an introductory course. An exception is found in Chaps. 14–18, where some results from quantum mechanics are used without deriving them from first principles. (My students have often expressed surprise at this change of pace.) 3. I have not intentionally left out steps in most derivations. Some readers may feel that the pace could be faster, particularly after a few chapters. My students have objected strongly when I have suggested stepping up the pace in class. 4. Each subject is approached in as simple a fashion as possible. I feel that sophisticated mathematics, such as vector analysis or complex exponential notation, often hides physical reality from the student. I have seen electrical engineering students who could not tell me what is happening in an RC circuit but could solve the equations with Laplace transforms.