Acoustics of musical instruments - why is a saxophone like a violin?

Professor Jim Woodhouse

• 18:00 - 19:00 Bristol-Myers Squibb Lecture Theatre Lent Term

Musical instruments like the clarinet and saxophone do not obviously have anything in common with a bowed violin string. This talk will explore the physics behind how these instruments work, and it will reveal some unexpectedly strong parallels between them. This is all the more surprising because all of them rely on strongly nonlinear phenomena, and nonlinear systems are notoriously tricky: significant commonalities between disparate systems are rare. For all the instruments, computer simulations will be used to give some insight into questions a musician may ask: What variables must a player control, and how? Why are some instruments “easier to play” than others?

The Unknown Maxwell

• 09:00 - 17:30 Cambridge University Engineering Department Lent Term One-Day Meeting

In the millennium poll, James Clerk Maxwell (1831-1879) was voted the third greatest physicist of all time – behind Newton and Einstein. He is best known for his equations of electromagnetism and thermodynamic relations, but his interests and achievements extended far beyond these fields. His profound insights across many extraordinarily diverse areas have laid the foundations for much of contemporary physical science.

The day will begin with an overview of James Clerk Maxwell’s life and achievements. The talks following will focus on just a few of the fields where he did seminal work, and in which current research is revealing interesting developments.

There will be a small exhibition of artefacts including some of Maxwell’s models from the Cavendish collection. The exhibition catalogue can be found here

James Clerk Maxwell had strong links with the Cambridge Philosophical Society during his time at Cambridge. He studied mathematics as an undergraduate – initially at Peterhouse, but moving to Trinity before the end of his first term. He graduated in 1854, and shortly afterwards presented his first paper On the transformation of surfaces by bending to the Cambridge Philosophical Society. His career took him to Aberdeen, King’s College London and ther family estates at Glenlair before returning to Cambridge in 1871 to become the first Cavendish Professor of Experimental Physics. He was President of the Cambridge Philosophical Society 1875-1877. In 1879 he died in Cambridge at the age of 48.