Physics of rock climbing

Lectures: 1 session / week, 2 hours / session

Students are expected to attend class, read a little, do some back of the envelope calculations, engage in a research project, present twice, write a brief research proposal (3 pages), and write a research report (5 pages).

Research projects are open ended and students are encouraged to determine their own project. Projects are clearly limited by the scope of the seminar (6 units) and the availability of resources and funding. Nonetheless, there are many options: modeling of climbing systems (spread sheet, analytical models, finite element models), climber/physics education and curriculum development, simple experiments, climber psychology and habits survey, new equipment design/equipment improvement, and instrumentation for measurement of climbing systems. Students may work together or independently on projects according to the project scope and student inclination.

This is the planned schedule of events, and may not accurately reflect what actually happened in each session.

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