Translated by OfferLand from the original Traditional Chinese post. View original
Yu Jen Chen
Updated Nov 15, 2023
Surviving Erasmus MaMaSELF at LMU Munich 🇩🇪 | Second-Semester Courses: Notes and Reflections
Guten Tag! Ich heiße Owen!
I already covered course selection tips and how to get through the courses in my first-semester article. If you haven't read it yet, go check it out!
Fundamental of Materials Science II — Functional Materials (LMU) — required course, 4 ECTS
It follows exactly the same idea as last semester's Fundamental of Materials Science I: 12 lectures, 12 different professors, 12 different topics. Each professor emphasizes different things, so the number of slides and the depth of the content vary. I understand the course is meant to give students a foundation in different areas of materials, but I have to say that cramming knowledge into us this rigidly doesn't seem to fully work.
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High Resolution Microscopy(LMU) — required course, 6 ECTS
This is a required course with Block Courses. During the semester, students are taught the theory behind instruments such as SEM, TEM and EBSD. Then, in a week after the semester, the class is split into small groups that attend hands-on sessions on the instruments in their assigned time slots. So even in a German master's program where classes focus on theory and exams, you don't have to worry about missing the basic concepts of these core materials science instruments. Given how the course is designed and how well the professors work together, I think it's very much worth taking.
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Crystal Physics — Lecture(LMU) — elective, 5 ECTS
I have to say, this is the course I recommend most out of everything I've taken at LMU or TUM this past year.
Of course, from the course name alone, a lot of people will think I'm joking. Physics is hard enough on its own, and now add crystals on top of it. Even if you know the course will definitely help you later, who wants to add to their own load? On top of that, this course has Block courses too. So why would I tell everyone they absolutely have to take it?
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FOPRA Experiment 101: Lithium-Ion Battery (TUM) — elective, 1 ECTS
If you're short a few credits, TUM's FOPRA is definitely the first thing to pick. The FOPRA courses I took this semester were all good quality, and the tasks weren't complicated.
Take this lithium battery one, for example. We couldn't actually build anything, but from explaining the concepts to analyzing the data, the TA explained everything just right and was very patient. Even though you write a lab report at the end, I personally don't think the workload is too heavy. It's a high-quality elective lab.
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For more, read my Medium article with the same title!!! You're also welcome to follow me on Medium, where you can read 50-plus other articles, including study-abroad stories and travel logs~
Erasmus MaMaSELF慕尼黑大學(LMU)求生記🇩🇪|第二學期修課心得與檢討
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