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Description: Special Theory of Relativity is considered as one of the major revolutions of the twentieth century, the second one being the ‘quantum theory’. Roger Penrose wrote: ‘Albert Einstein had such extraordinary deep perceptions of the workings of Nature that he laid foundation stones for both of these twentieth century revolutions in the single year of 1905.’ Since Einstein is considered as one of the supreme intellects of all time, in Chapter 1 the author has given his brief life sketch. In the following chapters, the author has tried to explain (in an easy-to-understand manner) the basic physics and the fascinating consequences of the Special Theory of Relativity.
Review of the first edition of the book
‘Many may have the nation that relativity is difficult to understand, but not in Professor Ghatak’s hand. The Special Theory Relativity by Professor Ajoy Ghatak has been a delightful book in paperback. Here relativity is fun, fascinating and enjoyable to students, teachers and anyone interested to know what special theory of relativity is. In this book, the author presents the special theory of relativity (STR) to young physicists in a lucid and exciting manner. He touches on history, relativistic kinematics, relativistic dynamics and relativistic electrodynamics briefly and in a novel approach. The book is presented with lots of examples, illustrations and problems at the end of each chapter … The author presents time dilation in a simple fashion where the constancy of the velocity of light in different frames is presented in a subtle fashion….In the following chapter the author treats the mass-energy relationship in a simple way using Doppler shifts of two emitted photons from a moving source. This approach avoids the cumbersome relativistic collision dynamics and shows how the mass of a moving body changes with its velocity.’Professor B.K. Chatterjee and Professor S.C. Roy in Science & Culture (July 2009)
Contents: Chapter 1: Albert Einstein: A Brief Life Sketch and his Numerous Contribution • Chapter 2: Time Dilation and Length Contraction : Introduction • Speed of light for a moving source • Time dilation • The Mu-meson experiment • The length contraction • Understanding the Mu-meson experiment via length contraction • Length contraction of a moving train • Simaltaneity of two events • The twin paradox • The Michelson morley experiment • Brief historical remarks • Problems • Reference • Chapter 3: The Mass-Energy Relation : Introduction • The mass-energy relation • The Doppler shift • Problems • References • Chapter 4: Lorentz Tranformations : Introduction • The lorentz transformations • Transformation laws for the components of the momentum vector • Addition of velocities • Problems • Appendix A : Equations describing galilean tranformation • Appendix B: Invariance of the wave equation under lorentz transformation • Appendix C: Relativistic expression for kinetic energy ISBN - 9788130918952
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Pages : 169
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