Prerequisites for Internship in Quantum Mechanics

[Wrichik Basu]

I would be in college in 2019 (currently I'm in standard 11). I'm greatly interested in Quantum mechanics, QFT, QCD and Quantum Geometerodynamics. Of these, I want to do an internship on the first, because I don't think I'll be able to touch the others till the 2nd year in college.

I'm living in Kolkata, and I intend to do an internship in India. Nevertheless, prerequisites should be same across good universities in the world.

I want to keep myself prepared to the greatest level possible so that I can apply for internship as soon as my summer holidays start.

What are the basic necessities that I must have in order to do an internship in QM? The topic may be anything on QM. What should be the minimum level of knowledge that I should have before I can apply for an internship?

I'm seeing many of my seniors suffer while doing internships because they were not aware of the prerequisites, and they are taking much longer than usual to finish the internship. I don't want that happening to me. Hence I want to be prepared as far as possible.

 

[mfb]

I don’t think there are “internships in QM”. That would be like an “internship in walking”. It might be required, but it is a tool to do something else.
At this level, that will typically mean (a) review existing literature about some well-studied topic or, as more ambitious project, do some calculations for something exotic that didn’t get much attention so far.

Required knowledge: It depends on what you want to do. Some very basic things require nearly nothing. If you want to understand what you are doing: Linear algebra for sure. Analysis is useful as well, but that can be more “physicist-style”: You should be able to calculate some derivatives and integrals, but you don’t have to know all the details of their mathematical definitions. Complex numbers. Classical mechanics, up to the Lagrange and Hamilton formalism. And quantum mechanics, of course.

While it is easier to learn these things with physical lectures and graed homework problems, there are various free and non-free textbooks, lecture notes and videos of lectures that you can have a look at.