| dc.description.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. | en_US |
