<p>I always hang out in Engineering forum. But it seems like no one can provide a good answer to that question. Since Cornell offers EP, may be there is a CCer in EP program can help clarifying what EP is.</p>
<p>I am curious about this major. What exactly do you do? After comparing the courses with engineering and physics, there is definitely something in commons and different. It seems like EP is very similar to Applied Physics.</p>
<p>Mathematical physics - I don't see those in regular physics major. At my current school, a physics major requires the completion of calculus, linear algebra and vector analysis, and differential equation.</p>
<p>I look at Harvard's Graduate Physics program, and it has Mathematical physics 1 and 2 listed.</p>
<p>So what is the deal at the undergraduate level?</p>
<p>If you have been in EP, how useful is it?
My personal interest is quantum chips. I do plan on going to graduate physics. I am a computer engineering student at the moment.</p>
<p>I am currently a junior in AEP. While it does overlap a lot with a traditional physics major, it is also distinct in many ways. To clarify the name issue, the undergraduate division is known as Engineering Physics and the graduate section is Applied Physics.</p>
<p>Since it is offered through the engineering college, there is a large emphasis on practical applications. The goal of AEP is the learn the foundations of engineering science to gain knowledge at a more fundamental and non-specialized level compared to other disciplines. However, the program is structured so that there is still an opportunity to specialize in preparation for an industry-level position or graduate school during the final year.</p>
<p>EP at the undergraduate level is really suitable with those who have the intention of going on to graduate school. Jobs aren’t as widely available for EP majors as other more traditional engineering majors (though not rare by any means). </p>
<p>The atmosphere in AEP is quite intimate, which the average class having only about 40-60 students. There is a lot of opportunity for interaction with professors, and ample opportunity for research involvement as well. We also recently got an amazing new building designed for the AEP department which will surely prove to be a huge advantage.</p>
<p>Most of the work is problem sets and problem solving. You will definitely have to have a great deal of creativity and time management to avoid getting overwhelmed. EP is widely regarded (among the students, at least) as the “hardest” major, though this is all relative of course. If you like physics and enjoy what you do, there is nothing “hard” about it.</p>
<p>When you say problem sets and problem solving - do you have any typical example?
What is the most difficult problem that you have encounter so far?</p>
<p>Almost all of your homework consists of nothing but complex physics problems. People typically take 3-4 of these classes every semester, so having that many sets of problems a week becomes a huge time burden. The specific problems themselves are not overly difficult - they are easy to solve provided you have been paying attention in class and keeping up with the reading. They are just time consuming because there are a lot of them.</p>
<p>See if you still feel that way after this year, I was a straight physics major in the dark ages, problem sets in the intermediate physics courses were often highly difficult and were not at all easy to solve (by me, anyway ! ). At that time, nobody was suggesting EP was any easier, more like separate but equal.
I’m flashing to problems involving electromagnetic fields using toroidal coordinates, which BTW had not been taught…</p>
<p>EP is definitely not easier than physics - they’re like the same courses with slightly different emphases. It’s just that I haven’t yet come across problems are just completely unsolvable. Who knows though, maybe soon enough…</p>