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Introduction to quantum mechanics
I was an undergraduate Physics major at Cal, graduating in 1992. As I progressed through my courses, I must admit that I did not typically make an effort to pick one professor over the other or schedule my courses in any particular order. I just took what and whomever came my way. When I took the first semester in our upper division quantum mechanics sequence, Physics 137A, what came my way was Rainer Sachs. He entered the classroom emphatically, a big presence with bushy hair and a loud and clear lecturing voice punctuated with a grumble that accompanied his 'r's. He definitely kept me awake! He taught a spartan course, harmonizing with Gasciorowicz' terse text. The topic immediately appealed to me. I remember distinctly walking out of LeConte Hall after one course, looking toward the Hearst Mining Circle, and realizing everything I saw was described by superpositions of an orthonormal basis of wavefunctions. Soon thereafter, for the first time, I sought out courses specifically taught by my favorite professor. I guess I loved the way he coupled clarity of exposition with a ferocious interest in science and mathematics. The opportunity arose to learn from him about numerical analysis (Mathematics 128, I suppose), and so I gained practical skills in computing the properties of the quantum systems whose physics Rainer had explained to me earlier. Now, thirty-plus year later, what Rainer taught me, how he taught me, and how he taught me to teach, are foundational to my career. I find myself a Berkeley Physics faculty member, teaching quantum mechanics to new generations of students. And while my speciality of experimental atomic physics is a bit far from Rainer's specialization in theory and mathematics, the intuition I gained under Rainer's tutelage regarding quantum phenomena and their numerical simulation benefits me daily.
~Dan Stamper-Kurn