Course Descriptions

16:640:517 - Partial Differential Equations I

FALL 2023

Zheng-Chao Han

Course Description:

This is the first half of the year-long introductory graduate course on PDE. PDE is an enormously vast field, and is an important tool for studying problems in many areas of mathematics, in particular in mathematical physics, geometry, and applied mathematics. We will introduce the most useful methods and techniques through studying some prototype equations ---to build up experience and intuition--- rather than emphasizing the most general theories. This first semester course will be more basic, emphasizing the study of constructions and properties of solutions using relatively elementary tools; but the approaches that we will take will motivate and naturally lead to more sophisticated generalizations in more advanced treatment.

Text:

Course notes

Prerequisites:

A solid background in analysis at the level of first seven chapters of baby Rudin, basics of Fourier series, and the main theorems of vector calculus (e.g., divergence theorem).

************************************************************************

FALL 2022

Zheng-Chao Han

Course Description:

This is the first half of the year-long introductory graduate course on PDE. PDE is an enormously vast field, and is an important tool for studying problems in many areas of mathematics, in particular in mathematical physics, geometry, and applied mathematics. We will introduce the most useful methods and techniques through studying some prototype equations ---to build up experience and intuition--- rather than emphasizing the most general theories. This first semester course will be more basic, emphasizing the study of constructions and properties of solutions using relatively elementary tools; but the approaches that we will take will motivate and naturally lead to more sophisticated generalizations in more advanced treatment.

Text:

Course notes

Prerequisites:

A solid background in analysis at the level of first seven chapters of baby Rudin, basics of Fourier series, and the main theorems of vector calculus (e.g., divergence theorem).

************************************************************************

FALL 2021

Natasa Sesum

Course Description:

This is the first half of a year-long introductory graduate course on PDEs, and should be useful for students with a variety of research interests: physics and mathematical physics, applied analysis, numerical analysis, differential geometry, complex analysis, and, of course, partial differential equations. The beginning weeks of the course aim to develop enough familiarity and experience with the basic phenomena, approaches, and methods in solving initial/boundary value problems in the contexts of the classical prototype linear PDEs of constant coefficients: the Laplace equation, the D'Alembert wave equation, the heat equation and the Schroedinger equation. A variety of tools and methods, such as Fourier series/eigenfunction expansions, Fourier transforms, energy methods, and maximum principles will be introduced. More importantly, appropriate methods are introduced for the purpose of establishing quantitative as well as qualitative characteris tic properties of solutions to each class of equations. It is these properties that we will focus on later in extending our beginning theories to more general situations, such as variable coefficient equations and nonlinear equations.

Text:

Lecture notes plus Partial Differential Equation by Evans

Prerequisites:

basic undergraduate course in analysis

************************************************************************

Schedule of Sections:

 

Previous Semesters: