Partnership for Integration of Computation into Undergraduate Physics

These projects involve computer simulations and illustrative experiments to motivate and improve student understanding of the course material in a Thermodynamics and Statistical Mechanics course. They are meant to each be a week-long and are mostly adapted from Schroeder's "An Introduction to Thermal Physics" and other sources. Students are free to choose a computational platform, though they are encouraged to pick either MATLAB or Python, except for Project 3 which is typically done in Excel. Thermodynamics and Statistical Mechanics is an integrated lab/lecture course (double-periods three times a week). We use some of the extended class periods to work on these projects.