Syllabus

1. Revision of thermodynamics: isolated, closed and open systems, reversible and irreversible processes. Zeroth and first laws: heat, internal energy and enthalpy, Joule- Thompson coefficient. Second law: entropy. Gibb’s free energy, Third law: statements (Nernst, Planck and Lewis).

2.Introduction to statistical physics: statistical description of system of particles, microstates, ensembles, microcanonical ensembles, canonical ensembles, partition functions, free energy, chemical potential, grand canonical ensembles. Maxwell - Boltzmann velocity and speed distributions, thermodynamics of blackbody radiation. Specific heat of solids and lattice vibrations: Breakdown of classical theory, Einstein’s theory of specific heat, Debye approximation.

3.Classical and quantum statistics: Maxwell-Boltzmann, Fermi-Dirac and Bose-Einstein distributions.

4.Free electron theory of metals: The electronic specific heat, thermionic emission from metals, photoelectric effect of metals. Phase transitions: Introduction to Critical phenomena, Ising model, mean field theory. Introduction to Statistical mechanics of interacting systems.

Semiconductor Theory

5.Carrier statistics: Fermi-Dirac distribution of electrons in solids. Density of states and Fermi energy, Fermi surfaces in solids. Intrinsic semiconductors, statistics of electrons and holes in semiconductors, low-temperature approximation to Maxwell-Boltzmann Statistics.

6.Statistics of extrinsic semiconductors: generation of donor and acceptor levels. P-n product: majority and minority carriers. Excess carriers in semiconductors, Law of mass action and the p-n product.Rate theory and Arrhenius equation of doping level activation energy, working temperatures of semiconductors. Fermi level in extrinsic semiconductors. Statistics of recombination: recombination mechanisms, carrier lifetime and photoconductivity.

7.Carrier dynamics: Drift and diffusion of carriers, Einstein’s diffusion relation, Hot-probe technique. Semiconductor contacts, band bending approximation. The pn junction: depletion (space-charge) region, depletion layer width, continuity equation.