Mathematics 54, Spring 2008.

Instructor: Alexandre Chorin, 911 Evans Hall, chorin@math.berkeley.edu

Office hours: MF 11-12 am, F 2-3 pm.

Class: MWF 3.10-4 pm in 155 Dwinelle.

Textbooks: 1. Lay, Linear Algebra and its Applications, 3d edition, Berkeley paperback; 2. Nagle, Saff, and Snider, Fundamentals of Differential Equations and Boundary Value Problems, Berkeley paperback.

Syllabus: Linear Equations (4 lectures), Matrix Algebra (4 lectures), Determinants (2 lectures), Vector Spaces (7 lectures), Eigenvalues and Eigenvectors (4 lectures), Orthogonality (5 lectures), Symmetric Matrices (1 lecture); Second Order Linear Equations (3 lectures), Higher Order Linear Equations (4 lectures), Systems of Linear ODEs (4 lectures), Fourier Series and PDEs (5 lectures).

Grading: 20% homework and quizzes, 20% each midterm, 40% final.

Homework assigned on Monday is due on Wednesday; homework assigned on Wednesday is due on Friday, homework assigned on Friday is due on Monday; there is something due in every section meeting. The GSIs will accept late homework only at the meeting after that homework is due and give it half credit.

If you do not take the first midterm, the second will count for 40%. If you do not take the second midterm, the final will count for 60%. If you miss both midterms or the final, you will fail the class. Please save your midterms and quizzes, in case questions about the grading come up.

Quizzes: there will be a weekly quiz on Monday in the discussion section; there will be no make-up quizzes, but we will drop the two weakest quizzes when we compute the grade.

Transfer students: Students who did not take Math 1ab in Berkeley may be missing some material on ODEs which will be assumed known in this course, in particular the material in Stewart, Calculus: Early Transcendentals, Chapters 9 and 17. Such students should read this material on their own; it will be needed by week 9 of the course.

Head GSI: Lynn Scow; lynn@math.

For a detailed syllabus with homework assignments as plain text, click here.


For a detailed syllabus with homework assignments in pdf format, click here.


To connect to the head TA's website, click here .