(PHYS1151) Physics 1 for Engineers

Course description
This course is the first semester of Physics for Engineering students. It focuses on the study of mechanics, including
descriptions of motion (one-, two- and three-dimensional), Newtons Laws, conservation of energy and momentum,
rotation of rigid bodies, fluids, oscillations, and static equilibrium. The topics are drawn from the chapters of the textbook.
Every student should be registered in one lecture section (PHYS1151) one interactive learning session, ILS (PHYS1153)
and one physics lab section (PHYS1152 Introductory Physics Lab ). Please note that the Lab is a completely separate
course and you will get a grade for that course. The ILS (PHYS1153) is a one-credit course, which is required for the main
course PHYS1151.) You will receive the SAME letter grade in the ILS as you get in the Lecture part of the course.
The Introductory Physics Laboratories also host the Physics Workshop, which offers help with both general physics
problems and course related questions.

Text
University Physics, 13th Edition, by Young & Freedman, Pearson. (Note that you may also use the eText
version as well as the hardcopy or both.)

Course objectives
In this course, we want you to learn how to analyze mechanical systems using Newtons laws. In particular, you
should learn to:

describe motion graphically and algebraically in terms of velocity, acceleration and trajectory
apply calculus to the study of mechanics
identify the forces acting on a system, and represent these by a suitable vector diagram
from your analysis of these forces, explain the motion of a system based on Newtons laws of motion
understand the principles of conservation of momentum, energy, and angular momentum, and be able to use
these principles to analyze bodies and systems of particles
analyze the motion of rigid bodies in rotation
determine the forces, torques and angles of systems of bodies in static equilibrium
understand basic fluid statics and dynamics
analyze oscillatory motions

Faculty Information
Lecturer: Prof. Sergey Kravchenko
Office:120 Dana
Email: s.kravchenko@neu.edu
Lecture hours: 0915-1020 & 1030-1135
Classroom: 103CH
Office hours: Monday 11:35am-1:35pm, Wednesday 11:35am-12:35pm
Appointments will be scheduled for those students who cannot make the official hours
Lecturer: Prof. Enrique Moreno
Office: 209 Dana
Email: e.moreno@neu.edu
Lecture hours: 0915-1020 & 1030-1135
Classroom: 101CH
Office hours: Monday, Wednesday, Thursday from 3:00pm to 4:00pm
Appointments will be scheduled for those students who cannot make the official hours
Coordinator: Prof. Henry Smith
Office: 123 Dana
Email: h.smith@neu.edu
Lecture hours: NA
Classroom: NA
Office hours: Monday, Wednesday, Thursday from 10:30am to 11:30am
Appointments will be scheduled for those students who cannot make the official hours

Course organization
There are some special features of the organization of the course, which you should note:

Register for PHYS1153 (ILS)

You must register for a section of PHYS1153 as well as for the Lab, PHYS1152.
These sections are problem solving sessions called Interactive Learning Sessions (ILS). In these sessions, we
discuss questions you may have about the pre-assigned homework problems, and then you spend much of the
time working in groups on the second set of weekly problems, under the guidance of a faculty member and a
teaching assistant.
There will be a 20-25 minute quiz at the end of most ILS classes.

Read before class

You are expected to read the text before coming to class. Reading assignments will usually be from the
textbook following what is in the Syllabus, but they may be from handouts, or from pages on Blackboard.
These latter will be given in advance. If there is no special announcement about this, then it the reading
material is only your assigned chapters from the text.

Lectures
Understanding the material is another storythe lectures will in fact be discussions designed to help you
understand the material better, but they will begin with the assumption that you have done some reading at
home.

Homework Problems
We expect you to learn how to do all the problems in a given assignment (Homework A and Homework B), and
submit them on the Web to Mastering Physics.
Homework A will be due prior to the FIRST interactive learning session (ILS) of the week which is on
Thursday and thus it is often called the Pre-ILS. It is generally due on Thursday at 8 AM.
Homework B (or "Post-ILS") will be due by the following Tuesday, after you have had an opportunity to work
on these problems during the ILS. It is normally due at 2:00 AM on the Tuesday AFTER your ILS.
During the ILS, you will be work in a group to complete the problems of Homework B and the professor and
teaching assistant will be available for consultation during these sessions. After the session, you will be asked to
submit your answers to Homework B (each problem contains your own individual set of numbers) on the Web
to Mastering Physics.

Mastering Physics
Please direct all Mastering Physics-related questions (trouble with logging in, etc.) to Prof. Henry
Smith at h.smith@neu.edu

Weekly Quizzes
There will be a weekly quiz at the end of the ILS that will test your understanding with both
conceptual and numerical problems. Each quiz will last approximately 20-25 minutes.
Quiz policy is that, in general, if a student is more than one-half hour late for the ILS, that student
will not be permitted to take the quiz that week.

Exams
There will be a one hour (65-minute) midterm exam during the course and a two-hour final exam at the
end of the course. Please check the syllabus calendar page at the end of this for the date.

Assignments and Grading

Quizzes: 20%
About twelve 15-20 minute quizzes will be given during the term at the end of your Thursday/Friday ILS

session. The two lowest quizzes will be dropped.

There are no quiz makeups!

A quiz missed for any reason scores zero and will be one of the two dropped quizzes.

Homework: 12%
Your homework each week will include both conceptual questions and numerical problems assigned from the
textbook and other sources. You will submit answers on Mastering Physics.
One assignment (Homework A also called the Pre) will be due prior to the interactive learning session (ILS)
on Thursday or Friday. There will be NO extensions for Pre homework assignments.
A second assignment (Homework B also called the Post) will be due by the following Tuesday, after you have
had an opportunity to work on these problems during the ILS. Everyone may receive (if they so request) ONE
extension per term for a missed Post assignment.
The pre-ILS will be 4% and the post-ILS will be 8% of your grade respectively.

Midterm Exam: 16%

There will be one 65 minute midterm exam. It will be given during the regularly scheduled lecture classes.

Final Exam: 32%

The final is a two-hour exam during final exam week. The exact time and place will be announced during the
term.

Term Project: 5%
This will be a group project run through the ILS. Information about its details will be available after the Spring
Break.

Introductory Physics Lab: 15%

The grading system for the laboratory component will be explained by the faculty/staff for that course.
Note: The Lab (PHYS1152) is a separate course and you will get a letter grade for it depending on what you
have done in the Lab reports, but we will count your grade in the Lab as 15% of this course. This will help
many of you considerably.
Note: The ILS (PHYS1153) is also a separate course for which you will receive a Letter grade BUT this letter
grade will be the SAME as the letter grade you receive for PHYS1151.

Final Letter Grade

Your course grade will be determined both by your overall score, calculated according to the above percentages,
and by your score on exams and weekly quizzes alone, weighted in the same proportion as above. The following
table indicates target overall score ranges corresponding to various course grades.

Grade

Score

Grade

Score

92-100

B-

71-79

A-

88-90

C+

66-71

B+

85-88

63-66

79-85

C-

60-63

NOTE: IF you score at least 50% on the exams and weekly quizzes combined, your final grade will
be at least as good as that appearing in the table. IF you score below 50% on a weighted average of
the exams and weekly quizzes, or below 60% overall, your work will be examined on an individual
basis to determine your final grade, which is most unlikely to be higher than D in these cases.
Since exams and assignments can vary slightly in difficulty from quarter to quarter, the actual score
ranges may be adjusted slightly downward from those given in the table. Any such adjustment will be
decided by the instructors following the final exam, based on their judgment of various factors such as
the relative difficulty of the exams. However, it is most unlikely that such an adjustment will improve
your grade by more than one notch (for example, from C+ to B-) from that given in the table.

Study Groups
You are strongly encouraged to form small groups to work together on parts of the course. In the real science
and engineering worlds, you will spend a significant amount of your professional career working with other
people, and now is a good time to start.
On the other hand, you also want to be sure that you are learning to work independently. There is a delicate
balance here, which you need to discover for yourself as a part of maturing.

Help
If you have trouble with the homework, seek help immediately - do not fall behind in the course. You have at
least five places to go for help: your lecturer (after class, during conference hours, or anytime by arrangement);
your ILS instructor or the graduate assistant during office hours or by special arrangement; the Physics
Workshop in 300 Churchill near the physics labs (a schedule should be posted by the second week of class).
Engineering students can also seek help through the Engineering Student Services office on the second floor of
Snell engineering building and your fellow students in the course. Please see the document on this service in the
Course Materials section of Blackboard.

Academic Honesty
Academic integrity is essential in science and engineering and students in this course are expected to follow the
highest standards of academic honesty. For a detailed statement, see the University policy on Academic
Honesty.
Since students in this course are often encouraged to work in teams, some specific remarks are in order:
It is not considered cheating if you:

work together on homework assignments, as long as you each work out and submit your own final answers
get help from professors, physics workshop, tutors, etc. on the homework assignments
work together on preparing for quizzes and exams

It is considered cheating if you:

submit work done by others (without your participation) as your own

copy work on quizzes and exams

Understanding physics and learning to solve problems should be your goals in this course. In working with
others, you still have to come to a point where you sit down and work on your own.

Syllabus or Course Coverage

The table on the next page shows the expected sequence of topics lecture by lecture. We expect to hold to this
schedule but if it becomes necessary to modify it, we will let you know exactly what material you are
responsible for.

SYLLABUS
PHYS1151 SPRING 2012
Week Day Date

Lect

1 Mon

9-Jan

Wed

11-Jan

Topic
Vectors, Vector Addition, 1D
Velocity, Acceleration
Const Accel., Free Fall, 2, & 3D
Vectors

2 Mon 16-Jan

Force, Newton's Laws

4.1, 4.2, 4.3

Free body Diagrams

4.4, 4.5, 4.6

4 Mon 30-Jan

Applying Newton's Laws

5.1, 5.2

Wed

1-Feb

5 Mon

6-Feb

Work & Kinetic E nergy

Wed

8-Feb

" " "

10

Potential Energy & Energy

Conservation

11

Wed

13-
Feb
15-
Feb
20-
Feb

Wed

22-
Feb
27-
Feb
29-
Feb

9 Mon

5-Mar

Wed

Wed

7-Mar
12-
Mar
14-
Feb
19-
Mar
21-
Mar
26-
Mar
28-
Mar

13 Mon
Wed

14 Mon

Wed

Wed

Wed

Wed

15 Mon

Holiday

25-Jan

Wed

12 Mon

3.3, 3.4, 3.5

11 Mon

2.4,2.5,2.6 & 3.1,3.2

3 Mon 23-Jan

10 Mon

Projectiles, Circular Motion,

Integration

8 Mon

1.7,1.8 & 2.1,2.2,2.3

7 Mon

Quiz

18-Jan

Wed

6 Mon

Chapter.Section

Wed

5.3, 5.4

6.1, 6.2

6.3, 6.4

7.1, 7.2, 7.3

7.4, 7.5

Holiday

Midterm Exam (in Class)

Review Tue 21 Feb (evening)

12

Momentum, Impulse and

Collisions

8.1, 8.2, 8.3

13

8.4, 8.5, 8.6

Spring Break
14

Rotation of Rigid Bodies

9.1, 9.2, 9.3

15

9.4, 9.5, 9.6

16

Dynamics of Rotational Motion

10.1, 10.2, 10.3, 10.4

17

10.5, 10.6, 10.7

18

Equilibrium

11.1, 11.2, 11.3

19

11.4, 11`.5

2-Apr

20

Fluid Mechanics

12.1, 12.2, 12.3

4-Apr

21

12.4, 12.5, 12.6

10

9-Apr
11-
Apr
16-
Apr
18-
Apr

22

Periodic Motion

14.1, 14.2,14.3,14.4

23

14.5,14.6,14.7,14.8

11

Holiday

Summary and Review of Lectures