MATH 120A
Differential Geometry
Description: Lecture, three hours; discussion, one hour. Requisites: courses 32B, 33B, 115A, 131A. Course 120A is requisite to 120B. Curves in 3-space, Frenet formulas, surfaces in 3-space, normal curvature, Gaussian curvature, congruence of curves and surfaces, intrinsic geometry of surfaces, isometries, geodesics, Gauss/Bonnet theorem. P/NP or letter grading.
Units: 4.0
Units: 4.0
Most Helpful Review
Spring 2020 - I thought the course material was fairly straightforward, and Prof. Willis certainly helps make it even more so. He's a clear lecturer and he's always willing to take questions during lecture, help out during office hours, and take suggestions from students about the course structure, which was key since Spring 2020 was remote/online. The overall grade is: weekly homework (20%), two midterms (20% each), and the final (40%). Exams were fair, possibly even more so than the homework assignments, each of which always seemed to have one really tough problem. In general, I'd definitely recommend taking 120A with Willis.
Spring 2020 - I thought the course material was fairly straightforward, and Prof. Willis certainly helps make it even more so. He's a clear lecturer and he's always willing to take questions during lecture, help out during office hours, and take suggestions from students about the course structure, which was key since Spring 2020 was remote/online. The overall grade is: weekly homework (20%), two midterms (20% each), and the final (40%). Exams were fair, possibly even more so than the homework assignments, each of which always seemed to have one really tough problem. In general, I'd definitely recommend taking 120A with Willis.