Elements of Scientific Computing [Paperback]

Science used to be experiments and theory, now it is experiments, theory and computations. The computational approach to understanding nature and technology is currently flowering in many fields such as physics, geophysics, astrophysics, chemistry, biology, and most engineering disciplines. This book is a gentle introduction to such computational methods where the techniques are explained through examples. It is our goal to teach principles and ideas that carry over from field to field. You will learn basic methods and how to implement them. In order to gain the most from this text, you will need prior knowledge of calculus, basic linear algebra and elementary programming.Science used to be experiments and theory, now it is experiments, theory and computations. The computational approach to understanding nature and technology is currently flowering in many fields such as physics, geophysics, astrophysics, chemistry, biology, and most engineering disciplines. This book is a gentle introduction to such computational methods where the techniques are explained through examples. It is our goal to teach principles and ideas that carry over from field to field. You will learn basic methods and how to implement them. In order to gain the most from this text, you will need prior knowledge of calculus, basic linear algebra and elementary programming.Computing Integrals.-?Differential Equations: The First Steps.- Systems of Ordinary Differential Equations.- Nonlinear Algebraic Equations.-?The Method of Least Squares.-?About Scientific Software.- The Diffusion Equation.- Analysis of the Diffusion Equation.- Parameter Estimation and Inverse Problems. - A Glimpse of?Parallel Computing.- Index.

From the reviews:

This gentle introduction to scientific computing aims to convey the basic ideas, principles and techniques of computational science to undergraduates in mathematics, science and engineering. & The real strength of the text is its adroit mix of anl“'