Individual course details
Study programme			General physics, Computer and applied physics
Chosen research area (module)
Nature and level of studies			Master studies
Name of the course			Great experiments in physics
Professor (lectures)			Bratislav Obradovic
Professor/associate (examples/practical)
Professor/associate (additional)
ECTS		3	Status (required/elective)	elective
Access requirements	Electromagnetism and Optics
Aims of the course	An overview of the most important experiment in physics.
Learning outcomes	Basic knowledge of the design and implementation of the most important experiments in physics.
Contents of the course
Lectures	The course consists of lectures on the most important experiments that contributed to the development of physics. It will be analyzed their foundation, the way of technical implementation, the method of analysis and scientific conclusions that are made, and which have improved the theoretical concepts. 1. Galilean experiments with free fall and the inclined plane. 2. Newton's experiments in optics. 3. Experiments of interference and diffraction (Newton, Young and Fresnel). 4. The gas laws and the mechanical equivalent of heat. 5. The torsion balance in the study of the fundamental laws of physics (Coulomb and Cavendish). 6. Electromagnetism (Oersted, Ampere and Faraday). 7. Electromagnetic induction and the laws of electrolysis. 8. The electrical discharges in gases (Faraday, Crookes, Roentgen, Tesla, Thompson). 9. Natural and induced radioactivity, transmutation of elements. 10. The discovery of electrons and the structure of atoms. 11. The discovery of neutron and neutrino. In the second part of the course the most important current experiments in physics are presented. It will be analyzed the reasons for their setting, the expected scientific results, the method of technical implementation and expected theoretical interpretations. During the last classes in the semester, students have a fifteen minute presentation on some of the topics that are not discussed in the lessons.
Examples/ practical classes	Demonstrations of some experiments will be provided in the scientific or student labs.
Recommended books
1	Great Experiments in Physics: Firsthand Accounts from Galileo to Einstein ed. Morris H. Shamos, Dover Publication Inc., New York, 1987
2
3
4
5
Number of classes (weekly)
Lectures	Examples&practicals		Student project	Additional
2
Teaching and learning methods	Lectures and experimental demonstrations.
Assessment (maximal 100)
assesed coursework		mark	examination	mark
coursework		20	written examination
practicals			oral examination	50
papers
presentations		30