General Information
For a description of the course, including the grading policy, consult the course syllabus. Students are responsible for reading the syllabus and being aware of all the course and university policies. Students taking this course for graduate credit should consult the MATH 7110 syllabus.

Textbook: No textbook will be adopted. Support references are given in the syllabus.

Classes meet on TR, 11:00am–12:15pm, at Stevenson Center 1313 (3rd floor of the Mathematics Building).

Contact Information and Office Hours
Instructor's office: Stevenson Center 1515 (5th floor of the Mathematics Building).
Instructor's email: marcelo.disconzi@vanderbilt.edu.
Instructor's office hours: Thursdays, 4:00–7:00pm, or by appointment.
Instructor's office phone: (615) 322-7147.

Exams

Description	Date	Location and Time	Remarks
Test 1	Sept 28	in class	Study guide. Solutions.
Test 2	Nov 2	in class	Practice problems. Solutions to the practice problems. Solutions to the test.
Final Exam	Saturday, Dec 16	3pm, at SC 1313	Study guide.

Schedule
Below is an ongoing schedule for the course (for the academic calendar, click here). This will be updated regularly and, therefore, students should check this webpage frequently. The due date for each assignment will be posted as the course progresses.

Date	Material covered	Homework	Remarks
Aug 24	Introduction, motivations for PDEs. Class notes. Some notation and terminology.
Aug 29	Formal definition of PDEs, homogeneous vs. non-homogeneous, linear vs. non-linear PDEs. Class notes.	HW 1.	HW 1 is due on Sept 7. Solutions to HW 1.
Aug 31	Linear operators. First order PDEs. Class notes.
Sept 5	First order equations. Introduction to the method of characteristics. Class notes.	HW 2.	HW 2 is due on Sept 14. Solutions to HW 2.
Sept 7	The method of characteristics. Burger's equation. Class notes.
Sept 12	Limitations of the method of characteristics. Shocks. Class notes.
Sept 14	Existence and uniqueness for first order quasi-linear equations. Class notes.
Sept 19	The wave equation. D'Alembert's formula. Class notes.	HW 3.	HW 3 is due on Sept 28. Solutions to HW 3.
Sept 21	Finite propagation speed for the wave equation. Generalized vs classical solutions. Class notes.
Sept 26	Review for the test.
Sept 28	Test 1.
Oct 3	Initial-boundary value problem for the wave equation. Separation of variables. Class notes.	HW 4.	HW 4 is due on Oct 17. Solutions to HW 4.
Oct 5	Fourier series: basic ideas. Class notes.
Oct 10	Formal aspects of Fourier series. Class notes. Summary of theorems.
Oct 17	More on Fourier series: periodic functions and convergence of solutions to the wave equation. Class notes.
Oct 19	The Fourier transform. Class notes.	HW 5.	HW 5 is due on Oct 31. Solutions to HW 5.
Oct 24	The Laplace transform. Class notes.
Oct 26	A few tools from calculus in R^n. Class notes.
Oct 31	Review for the second test.
Nov 1	Test 2.
Nov 7	Laplace's and Poisson's equation. Class notes.
Nov 9	Fundamental solution to Laplace's equation.
Nov 14	Existence of solutions to Poisson's equation.
Nov 16	Existence of solutions to Poisson's equation. Class notes.	HW 6.	HW 6 is due on Nov 30. Here are a few extra practice problems that will not be collected.
Nov 28	Duhamel's principle. Solutions to the heat equation in R^n. Class notes.
Nov 30	Eigenvalues of the Laplacian. Class notes.
Dec 5	Review.
Dec 7	Review.

Anonymous feedback
Students are encouraged to bring suggestions and to discuss with the course instructor any concerns they may have, including something they think is not being properly handled in the course. But if you do not feel comfortable doing that, here you have the opportunity to send some anonymous feedback.