Recommended Math Courses for grad school

gccphys

Hi
I am in my third year undergrad, and am planning to study physics in graduate school.

I was wondering if anyone knows what sort of math graduate schools expect and or want incoming students to have? Mostly, I mean besides Calculus, vector calculus, linear algebra, and Differential Equations. I consider those to be fairly standard. But what sets you apart as an applicant, in terms of math?

Furthermore, what is expected of students in terms of mathematical coursework? What are students expected to know coming in?

Thanks.

Howers

I don't know if they "expect it", but besides the standard most physicists will do terminal/introductory courses in PDE, and complex and real analysis. Some will go even go as far as differnetial geometry and topoglogy.

I don't know what students are expected to know, but from the grad books I read, you should definately consider doing some of the courses I listed, especially PDE and complex analysis.

eri

I only had the courses you listed. The PDEs and real/complex analysis were covered in my mathematical physics courses (which were in the physics dept). The only time I used differential geometry and topology were in my general relativity course - if you're not planning to take that, then you probably don't need them (as far as I know).

tmc

This depends a lot on the fields you want to go into. Care to give us more details?

gccphys

Well I'm not entirely sure what I want to go into. At the moment I'm interested in experimental particle and atomic physics.