PHYSICS 5B

Physics for Life Sciences Majors: Thermodynamics, Fluids, Waves, Light, and Optics

Physics · 5 units · Undergraduate lower division (0-99)

Open the requisite map View official UCLA course listing ↗Find on Bruinwalk ↗

Thermal properties of matter, free energy, fluids, ideal gas, diffusion, oscillations, waves, sounds, light, and optics, with applications to biological and biochemical systems.

P/NP or letter grading.

When it runs

Fall 2025
Winter 2026
Spring 2026
Summer 2026
Fall 2026
Winter 2027
Spring 2027

Scheduled, not typical — from UCLA’s Schedule of Classes, which publishes Fall 2025 through Spring 2027 and nothing before it.

Checking the Schedule of Classes…

Requisites

Official UCLA wording
Requisite: course 5A.

BruinTree reads · Prerequisite

confidence 1.00 · from text

PHYSICS 5A

Requires

Everything that has to come before this course, not just the courses named in the requisite above.

PHYSICS 5B

PHYSICS 5APhysics for Life Sciences Majors: Mechanics and Energy
- LIFESCI 30AMathematics for Life Scientists
- MATH 3ACalculus for Life Sciences Students
  - MATH 1Precalculus
- LIFESCI 30BMathematics for Life Scientists
  - LIFESCI 30AMathematics for Life Scientistsanother path to it
- MATH 3BCalculus for Life Sciences Students

1 direct requisite. The whole upstream is here — 10 courses over 3 levels. Every course here opens its own tree.

Unlocks

What this course is a requisite for, and what those courses lead to in turn.

PHYSICS 5B5 more beyond

PHYSICS C186Neurophysics: Brain-Mind Problem
PHYSICS 192MMethods and Application of Collaborative Learning Theory in Physical Sciences
A&O SCI 51Fundamentals of Climate Science
- A&O SCI 112Climate Change Assessment
  - A&O SCI 121Climate Mitigation Solutionsanother path to it