Elements of Mechanics

This lecture note style textbook on mechanics is aimed at undergraduate physics majors and providing a complete introductory course in mechanics based on the lecture course offered at the author’s institution. Ensuring a solid appreciation of the principles of mechanics, it includes the fundamentals and some more advanced topics and teaches though a large number of examples and real life applications. The book includes a range of problems and will be accompanied by a detailed solution manual.

The first volume in a three-part series, Elements of Mechanics provides a rigorous calculus-based introduction to classical physics. It considers diverse phenomena in a systematic manner and emphasises the development of consistent and coherent models guided by symmetry considerations and the application of general principles. Modern developments colour the presentation and are alluded to when most relevant, but the focus remains firmly on the classical formulations and model descriptions of particular physical systems.

The specific topics covered in Elements of Mechanics include:

• Kinematics in one and more dimensions in Cartesian and polar coordinates
• Dynamics, Galilean Relativity and Newton’s Laws of Motion
• Energetics, work–energy theorems, conservative forces, and potential energy
• Impulse and momentum, systems of particles and rigid bodies
• Rigid body rotational kinematics, dynamics, and energetics
• Statics
• Newton’s Law of Universal Gravitation

The book prepares undergraduate students majoring in the natural sciences and engineering for intermediate and advanced classes in their disciplines which rely upon this foundational material. It also supplies a comprehensive review in preparation for graduate or professional exams. Therefore, the series is structured in such manner that the second and third books, Properties of Materials and Electricity and Magnetism, follow upon the first, but may be read independently of each other. Written in a conversational and accessible style, the material is presented in standard, canonical sequence. Worked examples and collections of problems serve to illustrate and illuminate subject material in each volume.