More theoretical introductions? - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / beginners

author: TNorthover
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: February 27, 2017, 04:10:09 am
content: To complement the recent thread on Art of Electronics, does anyone know of any electronics introductions that have a strong theoretical basis, deriving the equations and behaviours from Maxwell and/or QM?I'm asking because in the physics world there's a whole cottage industry of "Quantum Theory for Mathematicians" style books, for people who are fine with Hilbert spaces and cofibres (whatever they are, never quite got to the bottom of that) but don't necessarily know much about quantum physics.I've not seen anything similar for electronics though, and I wonder if I'm just not picking the right terms to search for. Maybe I need to choose some subset of electronics for a single book to make sense or something.

author: rstofer
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: February 27, 2017, 04:35:58 am
content: Maxwell came up much later in the program in a course titled "Field Theory". I don't recall if it was 3rd year or 4th but it was long after DC and AC circuits. Good thing too! Nobody would have had the math required to even enter the classroom. From my personal perspective, it wasn't a useful course. I've played with the material from just about every course I ever took but have never given a moment's thought to field theory. Yes, I know my clamp-on ammeter comes complements of Maxwell but I still don't understand curl and divergence.

author: IanB
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: February 27, 2017, 04:56:56 am
content: I would say that at the level of detail you are asking for, you would be in the domain of physics, not electronics. Electronics is basically applied physics. Practitioners don't necessarily need to know the theory, just the application. If you want to delve into the underlying theory then I think you would need to be looking at physics texts not electronics texts.

author: mash107
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: February 27, 2017, 05:40:42 am
content: Donald Neaman's Microelectronic Circuit Analysis and Design (1st edition) was my undergrad book, and I liked it quite a bit for laying a good theoretical foundation... progresses from linear circuits to active / transistor circuits quite nicely.Thought it was easy to understand, as well. Link is for the 4th edition:https://www.amazon.com/Microelectronics-Circuit-Analysis-Design-Donald/dp/0073380644/ref=sr_1_sc_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1488173875&sr=1-1-spell

author: mtdoc
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: February 27, 2017, 07:10:12 am
content: I'm not sure if this what you are looking for, but Appensix A ofFoundations of Analog and Digital Electronic Circuits by Anant Agarwalhas a review of the basis for the simplification of Maxwell's equations into the algebraic equations used in circuit analysis.Agarwall is the MIT professor who teaches the Circuits and Electronics course there. He is one of the pioneers of MOOCS and as such I don't think he minds the available PDF of his text book.His Circuits and Electronics MIT course lectures are available on youtube and well worth watching.

author: T3sl4co1l
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: February 27, 2017, 08:02:09 am
content: I'd love to see it. IMHO, fields (or at least transmission lines -- the zero-dimensional abstraction of the speed of light) are introduced fatally late in the curriuclum; they should be right alongside, or replacing, the earliest AC classes!If you'd like to dive right in, the traditional teaching uses vector calculus and differential equations. If you've been involved in a rather different part of mathematics, it might be a little harder to pick up...Tim

author: vealmike
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: February 27, 2017, 11:18:44 am
content: Crikey, I can't even remember the name of the textbook. I guess it was 30 years ago!Will have a look next time I'm in the loft. The answer is "yes" I do know of one, but you'll have to be a masochist to enjoy it. From memory it was full of useful examples like how far up a air filled coax could you suck oil by charging the coax. 4 sheets of A4 to calculate that useful nugget.

author: orolo
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: February 28, 2017, 01:01:08 am
content: I don't know about any book along the lines of "Electronics for mathematicians," perhaps because while there are many beautiful and complex mathematical constructions in electronics, they are much more classical and treaded than the cutting edge in QFT. Electronic related maths are not so fertile in Fields medals, I guess.The Art of Electronics is an engineering book, so they elegantly skip the deepest part of the fundamentals. I think writing the first chapter of the book was a daunting task, since the authors had to make sure the basic points were covered rigurously without getting swamped in details that don't add real value to the contents. An example is the treatment of Ohm's law: they say it works for metallic conductors, warn about strong nonlinearities in semiconductors and rarefied gasses, and let the reader interested in going down the rabbit hole consult Purcell and Morin'sElectricity and Magnetism.I don't have the book, but I imagine they describe the conduction electrons in a metal as a degenerate Fermi gas, and explain DC resistivity as scattering in the crystal lattice as the electrons drift in the E field. From there you can interpret the lattice excitations as a boson field (phonons) and entertain yourself for weeks on end with a mix of thermodynamics and electron-boson nonrelativistic QFT, all of that covered in many condensed matter physics textbooks. If the frequency of the electromagnetic field is increased, I guess the electron-boson-photon physics become so complicated that a semiclassical analysis, or directly Maxwell's equations, or some specific version of them (Pocklington equation), or even transmission line analysis, is enough to understand what's going on. There are many levels of interpretation, they are covered in many books of different branches of physics and engineering, and for the purposes of the book only Ohm's law is needed at first, with some additions about matching and termination of transmission lines much later on.I think electronics is so high in the physics ladder that almost any specific topic chosen requires a full library as backup. Not long ago two port terminals were being discussed, which derived in a discussion of air core coils, from there into their lumped equivalent at higher frequencies, from there into the axial and helyx propagation modes, turning them into waveguides, which can be treated with frequency-dependent reflection coefficients measured experimentally, or mathematically with models derived from simplifications of Maxwell's equations treated in several research papers.I'm a theory oriented guy, and I'm dismayed by the fact that I can spend weeks thinking about more and more details of my projects, instead of building them. I find the Art of Electronics refreshing; the authors build things that work in radio telescopes and deep sea probes, manage all these levels of complexity, and explain the working circuits in a simple, logical and exhaustive way. It's admirable.

author: TNorthover
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: February 28, 2017, 02:48:30 am
content: Quote from: mtdoc on February 27, 2017, 07:10:12 amThanks, that appendix looks very interesting as a way to think about things.

author: JenniferG
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: February 28, 2017, 04:20:28 am
content: How about "Electronic Devices" by Thomas L. Floyd? I guess it's a textbook that is commonly used in colleges currently, because it has many editions and well the latest edition sells for over $200.Someone recommended to me and said any edition would do. I went with the 2nd edition. Got it for $3 plus $4 shipping -- allegedly in "new" condition.. from amazon.com. I should have it any day.Anyone familiar with this book, and will it complement AoE pair of books?

author: rstofer
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: February 28, 2017, 02:08:04 pm
content: Alibris.com is another source for used books. I have bought several through their service.