| Date | Notes |
| W 1/6 | Classes Begin. Administrivia. Begin Chapter 7: Plane Electromagnetic Waves. Plane waves in dispersive medium: group velocity. |
| F 1/8 | Plane waves in dispersive medium: second order dispersion. model for ε(ω). |
| M 1/11 | Low frequency complex ε and conductivity, high frequency and plasma. Linear, circular, elliptical polarizations, Stokes parameters. |
| F 1/13 | Plane interface, specular reflection, Snell's law. Refracted and reflected amplitudes for perpendicular and parallel polarizations. |
| F 1/15 | Total internal reflection. Brewster's angle. Smoothly varying n(x), geometric optics, Eikonal function. (Section 8.10) |
| M 1/18 | MLK Day (no class) |
| W 1/20 | Eikonal equation, ray tracing, dynamics analogs. |
| F 1/22 | Fermat's principle. Confined paths. |
| M 1/25 | Magnetohydrodynamics. Hydrodynamics, sound waves. |
| W 1/27 | Magnetohydrodynamic waves. Master equation, longitudinal magnetosonic wave, Alfvén wave |
| F 1/29 | Sound wave. Damping from viscosity, conductivity. Plasma regime. |
| M 2/1 | Begin Chapter 9: Radiating systems. Helmholtz equation, Green's function, radiation regime. Long wavelength approximation. |
| 2 2/3 | Electric dipole radiation, angular distribution, total radiated power. Magnetic dipole radiation. |
| F 2/5 | Electric quadrupole radiation, angular distribution, total radiated power. |
| M 2/8 | Rotating sources. Exact solution, linear antenna. |
| W 2/10 | Linear antenna integrated power, radiation resistance. Modes for Helmholtz equation. |
| F 2/12 | Spherical Bessel functions. Spherical expansion of Green's function for Helmholtz equation. |
| M 2/15 | Multipole expansion. L operator, vector spherical harmonics. |
| W 2/17 | Multipole angular distributions |Xlm|2. Total power, radial energy density, radial angular density. |
| F 2/19 | Multipole sources. |
| M 2/22 | Multipole expansion for linear antenna. Begin Chapter 10: Scattering and diffraction. Cross section. |
| W 2/24 | Scattering from small dielectric sphere. Conducting sphere, electric and magnetic dipole moments. |
| F 2/26 | Conducting sphere. Parallel and perpendicular polarizations. Multipole scattering, circularly polarized incident wave. |
| 2/29–3/4 | Spring Break (no class) |
| M 3/7 | Multipole expansion. Scattering, absorption cross sections. |
| W 3/9 | Optical Theorem. Surface impedance. Midterm Exam, 7:00pm |
| F 3/11 | Expansion coefficients for conducting sphere. Numerical results. |
| M 3/14 | Diffraction. Scalar Kirchhoff integral. Single slit diffraction. |
| W 3/16 | Diffraction from circular aperture. Babinet's principle, Poisson's bright spot. |
| F 3/18 | Vector Green's theorem. Diffraction from conducting sphere. |
| M 3/21 | Diffraction from conducting sphere, shadow scattering, hard sphere scattering. |
| W 3/23 | Begin Chapter 11: Special Relativity. Spacetime, vectors and covectors, metric, Lorentz inner product. |
| F 3/25 | Lorentz transformations, rotations, boosts. |
| M 3/28 | Tensors. Proper time, 4-velocity uα = dxα/dτ, 4-acceleration aα = duα/dτ. |
| W 3/30 | Constant proper acceleration, amusing numbers. Relativistic velocity addition. |
| F 4/1 | Energy-momentum 4-vector pα = muα = (E/c, p). 4-vector current density Jα = (cρ, J). Gaussian units. |
| M 4/4 | Electromagnetic field tensor(s). Manifestly covariant Maxwell equations |
| W 4/6 | Lorentz force. Transformation of EM field. Transformed Coulomb field of point charge. |
| F 4/8 | Manifestly covariant Green's function, potentials and fields of charged point particle. (Liénard-Wiechert potentials). |
| M 4/11 | Another transformed Coulomb field of point charge. Radiation from accelerated charges. Larmor radiation, relativistic generalization. |
| W 4/13 | Relativistic angular distributions. |
| F 4/15 | Thomson scattering. Eddington luminosity. Action formulation of field theories. |
| M 4/18 | Lagrangian for electromagnetism. Symmetries, Nöther's theorem. Broken symmetry. |
| W 4/20 | Last day of class. Gauge symmetry, non-Abelian gauge symmetry, broken non-Abelian gauge symmetry, magnetic monopole solution. |
| W 4/27 | Final Exam, 12:30–2:30pm (Exam Period 27C) |