Discover the Top Graduate Textbook for Thermal Physics Studies

[Winzer]

What is the "standard" textbook for graduate studies in thermal physics?

 

[Landau]

I don't think there is any 'standard'. But known books are:
Landau & Lifschitz Statistical Physics (and Volume 9)
Reichl A Modern Course in Statistical Physics
Huang Statistical Mechanics

 

[whybother]

There's also:

Reif - Statistical and Thermal Physics
Pathria - Statistical Mechanics.

 

[whybother]

And another I like:

Feynman - "Statistical Mechanics: a set of lectures"

It's graduate appropriate though.

 

[Landau]

I don't know whether I would consider Reif as graduate level, maybe then also Thermal Physics by Kittel+Kroemer should be mentioned.

Oh, I forgot to name Schwabl's Statistical Mechanics (all titles are the same :) )

 

[whybother]

Hmm, Kittel & Kroemer we used for my undergraduate statistical physics course, and that was during sophomore year, so I'd exclude that one, maybe.

 

[Landau]

Yeah, we did too. But Reif is similar to Kittel & Kroemer in my opinion.
Well, it's not that important, everyone can check it out for himself.

 

[dx]

A not so standard, but classic book is "The Principles of Statistical Mechanics" by R. C. Tolman. Mostly concentrates on foundations.

 

[Count Iblis]

Kittel & Kroemer is the worst book on the subject I've ever seen. Reif is much better. Both are used to teach at the undergraduate level, so it may be that students don't see the difference as the Prof. will typically skip over the very detailed explanations given in Reif. Also, the last few chapters in Reif on non-equilibrium statistical mechanics are typically not covered at all in undergraduate courses.

 

[dx]

I'd also like to point out that Leonard Susskind of stanford is teaching a course on statistical mechanics currently, and the videos should be on itunes in a few months. Scans of few pages of his lecture notes are available here: http://www.welkinsky.com/Statistical_Mechanics/Lecture_1.html