CSE 291 (SP 2024 C00) Physics Simulation
Welcome to CSE 291 Topics in CSE: Physics Simulation.
- Lecture: Tue Thu 2:00pm - 3:20pm
- Classroom: WLH 2207.
- Instructor: Albert Chern (Office Hour: Tuesday 3:30pm-4:30pm, location CSE Building 4112)
- TA: Chad Mckell (Office Hour: Thursday 3:30pm-4:30pm. Location: CSE building B275)
- Sites:
- This page: Slides, lecture notes, HW
- Canvas: Link to Gradescope, and link back to this page.
- Piazza: https://piazza.com/ucsd/spring2024/cse291_sp24_c00 Q&A forum for the class.
- Gradescope: https://www.gradescope.com/courses/759112 (log in with School credential, entry code:
VBNVED) HW submissions.
- Lecture note: Physics Simulation
Syllabus
| Week | Tuesday | Thursday | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 4/2: Lecture prerecorded Introduction
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4/4: Lecture prerecorded Ordinary Differential Equations
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| 2 | 4/9: Dimensional Analysis | 4/11: Differentials and gradients
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| 3 | 4/16: Differentials and gradients | 4/18: Optimization and KKT conditions, calculus of variations
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| 4 | 4/23: Least action principle
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4/25: Variational integrators | |
| 5 | 4/30: Rigid Body Dynamics | 5/2: Constraints, Incremental Potential
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| 6 | 5/7: Constraints, Incremental Potential | 5/9: Tensors
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| 7 | 5/14: Elasticity | 5/16: Elasticity | |
| 8 | 5/21: Lecture prerecorded Fluids
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5/23: Lecture prerecorded Fluids
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| 9 | 5/28: Fluids (numerics)
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5/30: Fluids
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| 10 | 6/4: Hamiltonian mechanics
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6/6: No class (instructor unavailable) | |
| Final | 6/11: No class
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6/13: No class | |
| Summer break | |||
Overview
The course covers the mathematical and computational basis for various physics simulation tasks including solid mechanics and fluid dynamics. A main focus is constitutive modeling, that is, the dynamics are derived from a few universal principles of classical mechanics, such as dimensional analysis, Hamiltonian principle, maximal dissipation principle, Noether’s theorem, etc. These principles are the foundation to computational methods that can produce structure-preserving and realistic simulations.
You are expected to have basic programming and visualization skill.
Some highlight:
- Dimensional analysis: Utilize the scaling symmetry of a physical system to estimate the expected result, to identify equivalent models, or to reduce the number of parameters.
- Variational principles: Instead of accounting for all internal forces in a physical system, derive them by taking derivative of energy functions.
- Incremental potential: Turn each time step into an optimization problem, encompassing dissipative systems and impulsive systems.
- Constrained systems: Holonomic and nonholonomic constraints, quasivelocities, and the KKT conditions for inequality constraints.
- Continuum mechanics: An exposition of tensor analysis involving differential forms and their Lie transportations.
- Elasticity: Interaction between strain and stress, which are dual vector-valued forms related by a variational principle.
- Fluids: Navier–Stokes equation, vorticity formulation, surface waves, Eulerian and Lagrangian methods.
Course Logistics
Getting Started (make sure to follow it in Week 1)
- Sign up to Piazza and Gradescope.
- HW0 is due 4/11 (Thu).
Class Rules
- Do the assignments individually. Discussion is strongly encouraged, since there are many challenging new mathematical concepts and part of the learning experience is to try out your understanding to your peers.
- You can look up coding/math questions online. You are also welcomed to post questions (and answer others' questions) on Piazza.
- Follow Academic Integrity (c.f. https://senate.ucsd.edu/Operating-Procedures/Senate-Manual/Appendices/2).
Grades
There is no quiz or exam. The grades are made of the following HWs and project:
- HW0 (miniproject): 5%
- HW1 (written): 10%
- HW2 (written+miniproject): 25%
- HW3 (miniproject): 30%
- HW4 (miniproject): 30%
Late policy
- HW0–4 late penalty: You have one quota of using a 24 hour extension.