Reddit mentions: The best atomic & nuclear physics books

I agree with everything said in this thread, but to add some things:

I strongly recommend a good particle physics course. If you can think about the basic things in our field automatically in terms of Feynman diagrams and you know the rules of certain force interactions (everything but gravity being important, with EM and Weak force interactions slightly more important than strong in our field), I've found that helps me to understand the empirical/applied stuff a lot better.

I would seek to shadow as many medical physicists from as many different specialties as possible. It'll let you decide if you really want to be/what specifically you want to do in our field, as well as look good on any resume. I'd shoot for at least one shadowing session of clinical physicists in radiotherapy, nuclear medicine, and diagnostic imaging each, as well as a health physicist, and an undergrad internship at a company like Varian or Elekta (look to the AAPM for undergrad opportunities/funding). Some physicists appreciate teaching people while others don't, so don't give up if you're turned down on a cold call, but don't cold call the same person twice.

As a bonus, read Kahn, Attix, and Hall, if you have time. For Nuclear Med, I'd recommend Cherry, and for Diagnostic Imaging I'd recommend Bushburg. Definitely start with Kahn as it is the easiest to digest IMO. I'm sure others have book recommendations as well. Though, I wouldn't bother until you've at least taken your entry level classical mechanics and E&M courses, even then a lot wont click until you've taken Quantum 1.

Edit: oh also experience in programming will help. Matlab and/or python seem to be base in our field, though C++ cant hurt.

My experience with nuclear power comes from an nuclear physics course I took in undergrad.. so the stuff I was reading was not really suitable for a normal audience. We did everything from fission in stars to different types of fuels in nuclear reactions. Fukushima actually happened during my time in that course.

Then later I took nuclear energy for electrical engineers, focusing on the power generation itself. I didn't personally go into energy, and I have some friends who specifically work for power companies who could answer it better than me. But in general, you will have a hard time finding a power engineer that is against nuclear. They've done the math.

My textbook for the more understandable of the two courses was Nuclear Physics: Principles and Applications, which I strongly recommend despite it being an academic approach. A patient laymen would be able to understand the concepts of this book without much effort, however the math may require some outside assistance.

Comparing nuclear to other forms of (non-renewable) energy is really challenging without asking the person to do the math themselves. It's so astonishingly powerful that the first time you do the calculations you do them again because you're convinced no form of energy is that efficient. Well then you say to your professor, but the negatives are huge! I've heard all the news reports! Then you spend some class time going over figures, comparing forms of energy, per capita power, per capita death, and proportional lives lost and Nuclear stands with an INCREDIBLE record of near perfection while the media holds a magnifying glass over tiny scratches. Meanwhile all other forms of non-renewable energy hold a death-toll so high it's not even comparable to nuclear.

Renewable energy loses to nuclear simply because nuclear always works, produces magnitudes more energy, and can ramp up the reaction on the spot in response to an increase in the demand of power.

I hope my rambling has been of some help.. long story short I mostly studied the math and statistics behind it's safety. I haven't read any non-technical books but I'm sure someone here can help you out with a recommendation. Perhaps visit /r/NuclearPower for further reading.

Links you may find interesting:

Safety of Nuclear Power Reactors

MIT Course: Nuclear Plant Safety

General Wiki Info

Really understanding nuclear physics requires some really high level math.

In my opinion, this is the gold standard for nuclear physics. It's a higher level text, but I'd give it a try.

This is a great text for particle physics, which will help a lot with understanding nuclear physics.

Both of these are fairly advanced texts. They're designed for undergraduate physics majors, and they do have some pretty advanced math. Unfortunately, there isn't really a way around the math thing. Higher-level physics requires higher-level math.

If you're more interested in experiment, this book is a goldmine of information. It's less math-intensive.

If none of these float your boat, I would suggest starting out with some Wikipedia articles. They're usually a great place to start when you're looking to delve into a new subject. I'm sure you can find plenty of lecture videos online for introductory nuclear/particle physics classes. I don't know of any off the top of my head though.

All the best stuff I learned from excited grad students who had just learned it themselves. If you can't find one of them, it is in Jackson. But oddly enough, there was this one appendix in Blatt and Weiskopf that really explained it well. IIRC, you could probably digest it after a semester of Griffiths' E&M.

I'm reading "Shapes and Shells in Nuclear Structure" by Nillson and Ragnarsson. I've had to stop and learn some quantum mechanics because I haven't taken any classes on modern physics yet (only physics 1 and 2) but I figure if a physics sophomore like me can read it and comprehend most of it, then anybody with a basic understanding of quantum mechanics should do well with it. It's meant as a "first course in theoretical nuclear physics", if that is what you are interested in.

You'll love the subject, though. I know I did. After you learn yourself some normal optics and take upper division quantum mechanics, you should pick up Quantum Optics. It's a really interesting subject and you can start seeing light in a fashion more consistent with quantum field theory.

I've been reading Gauge Theories in Particle Physics: A Practical Introduction, Fourth Edition. You can find previous editions pretty cheap. I've found it to be pretty enjoyable and easy to understand. There is a lot of complicated math, but that's inevitable when covering this topic.

I've thought about learning some of it off of wikipedia, but I feel like the first article I read with spring up about 30 more articles I need to read to understand the first. I purchased this book which has a chapter or two on quantum mechanics, dealing with the wave nature of matter.

Do you have any recommendations on a decent introductory book? My class is using Quantum Chemistry by McQuarrie if you're familiar.

Physics of the Atom by Wehr, Richards, and Adair has a chapter on blackbody radiation and the photoelectron effect, if you are just looking for the basics. You probably need to consult something more practical like a semiconductor physics book to see how it is used in devices.

The usual notation for a function of more than one variable is <name>(<arg1>,<arg2>,...)

That is, B is a function of two variables, and the expression on the right is (B evaluated at Z and N) minus (B evaluated at Z and N-1).

Usually, function notation is introduced by Algebra II (or midway through the Integrated Mathematics sequence at some high schools), and the book you're reading expression appears on page 6) is for students with about the level of mathematical and physical understanding of a physics major, which includes but is not limited to multi-variable calculus, linear algebra, and ordinary differential equations.

You're way out of your depth here.

For trapped ion quantum computation if just looking at books:

Atomic Physics by Budker, Kimball, and Demille

Laser Trapping and Cooling by Metcalf and van der Straten

Quantum Computation and Quantum Information by Nielsen and Chuang