PHYS 1901: Oscillations, Waves and Chaos (Advanced)

Lecturer: Tim Bedding

Oscillations

• Lecture notes on complex algebra.
• Lecture notes from the smartboard:

• Simple Harmonic Motion from Physclips (UNSW)
• A pendulum on Moon
• A short documentary explaining the resonant oscillations in the London Millenium Bridge.
• Standing waves in a bridge in Volgograd, Russia. The oscillations were excited by gale-force winds and the bridge re-opened a few days later. The wavelength was actually quite long, the pylons are much further apart than they appear in the fore-shortened view along the bridge.
• Further reading: Article from The American Journal of Physics on "Resonance, Tacoma Narrows bridge failure, and undergraduate physics textbooks" by K. Yusuf Billah and Robert H. Scanlan (1991), explaining that this event should not really be described as a case of resonance.
• Further reading: Article in Physics World about bridge oscillations and how to control them. One of the authors, Prof. Ross McPhedran, is from our School of Physics.

Waves

• Acoustics and Vibration Animations (Dan Russell)
• Standing Waves in a vertically hung chain
• Standing Waves in an arrow in flight
• Standing waves and resonance in a peacock's display.
• Standing sound waves appelet
• single and double-slit interference pattern (1:45)
• Doppler effect
• Another interactive applet on the Doppler effect.
• Seismic waves from Virginia earthquake march across the US in this video
• Shock wave from a volcanic eruption in PNG.
• Shock wave from a supersonic jet plane
• Bow shocks in astronomy:
  • pulsar bow shock (X-ray and radio)
  • pulsar bow shock (H alpha, parabola)
  • pulsar bow shock (H alpha, guitar)

Chaos

• Lecture notes on chaos (useful for lab classes)
• Double square pendulum in the School of Physics corridor, including movies and a graph showing sensitive dependence on initial conditions
• Movie of a chaotic magnetic pendulum with three similiar initial conditions (Rob Hodgson, COSC3011 student)
• Chaotic behaviour of the damped, harmonically driven pendulum (Dr. Thomas Gasenzer)
• Animations by Rocky M. Jones and Kush N. Patel showing a double pendulum, triple pendulum, etc.
• Chaotic behaviour of the moons of Pluto
• video on chaotic systems
• magnetic pendulum
• Further reading: Article on chaos and strange attractors by Douglas Hoftstadter from the book Metamagical Themas, originally published in Scientifican American. The book Chaos by James Gleick is also an excellent introduction to the development of chaos theory.

Just for interest

• Article in Physics Review Letters (11-Feb-2016) announcing the direct direction of gravitational waves.
• xkcd cartoons: Frequency, Pendulum, Resonance, Turn Signals, Chaos and Jurassic Park
• a video of oscillating goats
• a video of wave-like patterns in a flock of birds
• Movies and animations of a falling slinky spring (A/Prof. Mike Wheatland, School of Physics)
• music video: Science vs. Music - Nigel Stanford