Prerequisites: MATH 205A, MATH 205B, MATH 205C; or PHYS 205; or consent of instructor
Description: Hamilton’s principle of least action. Variational meth- ods and Lagrange’s equations. Hamilton’s equations. Introduction to symplectic geometry and its applica- tions to classical mechanics. Poisson brackets. Conserved quantities and Noether’s theorem. Examples of Hamiltonian and dissipative dynamical systems. Introduction to classical chaos.