syllabus
& course
expectations & the official
time
safety,
tardy, classroom computer use, and honesty
Universe/publisher link: register as a student to use the resources
Astronomy
Picture of the Day
the
latest astrophysics discoveries
what's up in the sky
this week
| Monday, October 27 |
October 28 |
October 29 |
October 30 |
October 31 |
|
|
|
no
classes extended weekend |
we'll spend
half the time on neutrinos and half the time on starting stellar birth bring Fundamental Particles and Interactions handout to class today |
jit is ready
in Moodle....due
today by 9:00 am |
||
|
(always done before class) |
Weighing in on the Neutrino Mass -- the experiment that won the other half of the 2002 Nobel Prize in Physics & 20(1,2), including box 20-1 |
20(7,8) |
20(3,4) |
||
things you should know the answer to before coming to class |
did you remember to think about convection? why does it occur in the water heated on top of the stove but not in the pan itself? sinimlarly, why does convection happen only in the upper 30% of the sun, and not in the inner 70% |
for neutrinos what did physicists learn from the neutrino experiment described in the article above for starbirth what's in the interstellar medium? what are the 3 types of nebulas present? how do each of them show themselves? how do we know they are there?: what are 3 pieces of evidence for the presence of interstellar dust? ditto for interstellar gas? |
|||
homework (written assignments to be turned in) |
|||||
|
|
shockwaves
star formation: star formation propagation(grav collapse induced by shock wave from O/B stellar winds) M16 before
hubble shock-wave
triggered starbirth star
death/supernova: Cygnus
loop shock wave spiral shock waves in galaxies: M51 as seen by
Hubble 2005 M83's emission nebulae
and its spiral arms a bow shock near LL Orionis the Antennae, a galaxy-galaxy collision molecular clouds & cooling molecules in space the GMC at the heart Of Orion |
how stellar
disks form
and evolve (theory in pictures) the first observations of jets and
disks during stellar
birth Stellar
Disks Set Stage for
disks without
jets: planet
building?:
Orion
Nebula
Mosaic and |
|||
|
|
|||||
|
of the week |
the
extrasolar planet e Eridani makes the USA Today front page Spitzer IR telescope finds 2 asteroid belts around e Eridani |
| Monday, October 20 |
October 21 |
October 22 |
October 23 |
October 24 |
|
|
|
|||||
|
(always done before class) |
Walker
15(2 on Pascal's principle.... how does pressure vary with depth?) Walker 15(3 on the origin and formula for the buoyant force & Archimed principele) Walker bottom of p. 549-551 on the derivation of the perfect gas law review Universe 18(2) |
21(1,3) & 18(3 + should have been 4) the direct evidence that fusion is going on inside the sun bring your fundamental particles and interactions sheet to class today if you didnt have time to finish calculating the pressure difference in your layer, please calculate it before class today and send it to me (make sure you tell me which layer is yours too).... if you have questions or think your numbers are incorrect, come by for help the direct evidence that fusion is going on inside the sun |
Universe 18(4) + Walker 16(6) on conduction, convection, and radiation convection is everywhere (and especially see the pictures & captions): convection in the kitchen and in a greenhouse (bottom of p 182 & top of p 183, Universe) convection in the earth's core (p 184) convection in the earth's mantle ( p 189) convection in the earth's atmosphere (p 196-197) convection in Jupiter (p 290-291) |
Weighing in on the Neutrino Mass -- the experiment that won the other half of the 2002 Nobel Prize in Physics | |
things you should know the answer to before coming to class |
how did the temperature
get to be so high at the center of the sun so that fusion could start? why doesn't the sun collapse under its own gravity? why does the gas pessure increase with depth in the sun? why does the gas temperature increase with depth in the sun? how does the energy released in fusion get to the surface? by what processes? |
||||
homework (written assignments to be turned in) |
YOUR
nuclear reaction (for which you have signed up on the solutions whiteboard): 1) name & show the three integer conservation laws 2) calculate the KE/light released (or absorbed?) in Mev in the nuclear reaction, following the same steps we did in class 3) calculate the efficiency of the reaction if any of your nuclei are not in Appendix F in Walker, find the mass (in u) here (type your isotope, for example C-12, in the box at the upper left) start EARLY, so that if you end with questions, you can come get help! |
bring
a circle cutout (on colored paper) that reflects your planet's properties and environment: 1) the color of your paper will depend on YOUR PLANET'S TEMPERATURE: BLUE if T < 150 K GREEN: 150 K < T < 250 K YELLOW: 250 K < T < 350 K WHITE: 350 K < T < 650 K ORANGE: 650 K < T < 1000 K RED: T > 1000 K 2) the size of the cutout will depend on YOUR PLANET'S MASS: 1-INCH diameter = 1 Jupiter mass 2-INCH diameter = 2 Jupiter mass etc 3) KNOW the semimajor axis of your star's orbit, so that you can put it on the board at the right place 4) on your cutout, write a) the SPECTRAL and LUMINOSITY CLASS OF YOUR PLANET'S STAR on the front b) the MASS of your planet in JUPITER UNITS on the back & the median TEMPERATURE of YOUR PLANET on the back C O L O R E D card stock is in the black box; please don't take more than you need |
|||
|
|
he first neutrino image
of the sun
Super-Kamiokande and its photomultipliers surrounding the water (before it was destroyed in a chain reaction) Sudbury Neutrino Observatory detection physics the Mystery of the Missing Neutrinos -- this experiment won half of the 2002 Nobel Prize in Physics |
statistics of exoplanets exoplanets: histograms correlations brown dwarfs, planets, and superplanets |
|||
|
|
|||||
|
of the week |
| Monday, October 13 |
October 14 |
October 15 |
October 16 |
October 17 |
|
|
|
jit 6 (2
questions for today) is now ready in moodle |
jit 6 (2 new
questions for today) is now ready in moodle |
|||
|
(always done before class) |
mass/energy inventory of the universe spend at least 30 - 45 minutes reading some of the links therein particularly interesting are the ones in the non-baryonic row (especially the cluster collisions, the dark matter ring, and the first part of the "Search for Dark Matter" article) |
19(8) |
Walker
32(1) and alpha, beta decay examples in chpater 32 plus your intro physics course, intro chemistry course, and the astrophysics course! 18(1) could also be helpful |
Universe
18(1,2) |
|
things you should know the answer to before coming to class |
the difference between macrolensing and microlensing and we still haven't done: the deeper eclipse of an eclipsing binary system is always the eclipse of the _____________ star (BIG hint: in which of the two eclipses is more area covered?) |
questions
I will ask first thing in class today: 1) what types of motion have we covered in class that show up in the Doppler effect (there are 2; make sure that you know both, since we have done them in class) 2) what 4 OTHER types of motion can show up in the Doppler effect that we have NOT done in class?? (actually I think we may have mentioned 1 of these 4 for about 10 seconds one day, but ....) please make sure your list includes at least 3 |
what is the strong force's strength (relative to the electric force)? from Universe how did the temperature get to be so high at the center of the sun so that fusion could start? why doesn't the sun collapse under its own gravity? why does the gas pressure increase with depth in the sun? why does the gas temperature increase with depth in the sun? how does the energy released in fusion get to the surface? by what processes? |
||
homework (written assignments to be turned in) |
for
YOUR planet (and using ONLY the observable quantities: period, radial velocity curve of your planet's star, and spectral/luminosity class of the star) 1) attach a printed copy of your planet's star's radial velocity curve as the cover sheet to this assignment 2) find the lower limit to your planet's mass 3) % difference between your value and the accepted value (in one of the extrasolar planet catalogs) (the % should be less than 2% unless your orbit is noticeably elliptical, in which case the difference might be as much as 10% if extremely elliptical) d) the planet's orbit size e) % diff , compared to catalog f) a range for the planet's surface temperature (using a reasonable range for your planet's albedo) g) the likely composition of your planet based on its formation temperature (with justification) |
||||
|
|
|||||
|
|
binary
star lab due |
||||
|
of the week |
| Monday, October 6 |
October 7 |
October 8 |
October 9 |
October 10 |
|
|
|
bring
lab book to class |
bring lab book
to class with semimajor axes for each orbit and masses for each star
calculated in units asked for |
bring to class
in your lab book: 4 pictures of the relative positions of the two stars in our eclipsing binary, RW Mon (or 1 picture with the 4 different instants labeled) for the times we labeled [ t1, t2, t3, and t4] on the light curve in class yesterday 2 (d-v-a-t) equations, one for the diameter of the large star and one for the diameter of the small star, in terms of t1, t2, t3, and/or t4 AND vorb,A and/or vorb, B |
bring a PRINTED
copy of your extrasolar planet's star's radial velocity curve to class! some time to finish the binary star lab in class; bring lab book from the physics equations we used in lab tuesday (N's version of K's 3rd law, with special units; the center of mass condition, the formula for speed in a circular orbit), show that mB3/(mA+mB)2 = PvA3/(2p)3 |
no JIT this
week bring your calculation of our galaxy's mass (inside the radius selected for you) to class on paper to hand in at the beginning of class |
|
(always done before class) |
Walker
9(7) know the formula for position and velocity of the center of mass |
8(6)
on how we know there are extrasolar planets |
nothing
new |
25(4) & Box 25-2 |
|
things you should know the answer to before coming to class |
how
to determine a) the orbit sizes of the two stars b) the masses of the two stars from the data given for RW Mon (data on p 16 of the yellow book; lab instructions on page 15) as you will have only 35 minutes to actually do it in class where does Kepler's 3rd law come from? (the one on p. 81) what more basic physics goes into it? can you derive it from the more basic physics laws? |
how to calculate the diameter of both the large star and the small star for our RW Mon binary see Monday's entry (a great show/tell problem), since we didnt do it Monday where does Kepler's 3rd law come from? (the one on p. 81) what more basic physics goes into it? can you derive it from the more basic physics laws? |
know how astronomers determine the mass of our galaxy come to class with the following sentence filled in correctly (AND with an explanation!) the deeper eclipse of an eclipsing binary system is always the eclipse of the _____________ star (BIG hint: in which of the two eclipses is more area covered?) |
||
homework (written assignments to be turned in) |
homework
on magnitudes due Tuesday: 1) a) using only the apparent magnitude (vs time) graph on page 480, determine how many times delta Cephei is at brightest than when it is faintest (on this and all future parts, make sure you show me what you did; do not just announce the answer) b) determine the period of delta cephei (the figure caption has an incorrect period) and use it to determine the average luminosity (it's a log scale! treat accordingly!) using the period-luminosity diagram on the adjacent page (delta Cephei is a type I cepheid); then use this luminosity (relative to the sun) to determine its average absolute magnitude c) finally, find the distance to delta Cephei 2) a) advanced question 19(40) AND also find the difference in the b) their apparent magnitudes c) their absolute magnitudes 3) the 4th-brightest appearing (and the nearest) star in the sky, alpha centauri, is actually a double star with components cleverly named A and B.... the stars are so close that they cannot be seen indiviudally by the eye... using the data in Appendix 4, find the apparent magnitude of the combined light of the alpha Centauri AB system |
||||
|
|
the eclipsing
binary applet Princeton catalog of extrasolar planets France catalog of extrasolar planets (this catalog is more likely to have a link to the radial velocity curve for your planet; however, not all of the planets' names listed are according to the constellation name/number by which you picked the planet today.... so you will have to go to the Princeton catalog above to find the other names of your planets if you were silly enough not to write ALL the names down off the sheets posted) |
are periodic
extinctions
|
|||
|
|
|||||
|
of the week |
|
September 29 |
September 30 |
October 1 |
October 2 |
October 3 |
|
|
|
|
|
now that I think about it, there is probably a better than average chance that we will start the lab by mid-block |
today |
|
|
(always done before class) |
|
(why not??) |
|
AND Box 4-2 4(6,7) should be a review sections 4(1-3) provide a nice historical background |
|
| things you should know the answer to before coming to class | bring to class: 1) a calculation of the age of the universe in YEARS, given that H = 71 km/s/Mpc 2) a calculation of how much you would grow IF you were participating in the expansion of the universe a) first calculate how fast (in km/s) your head would be receding from your foot by using the Hubble law b) then, assuming that this speed remains constant during your lifetime, calculate how much you would grow during your remaining lifetime due to the expansion of the universe (which of course doesnt apply to you, as we discussed earlier in class last week) |
know Kepler's 3 laws and what physics is hiding behind each of them |
|||
| homework (written assignments to be turned in) |
homework
on magnitudes due Tuesday: 1) a) using only the apparent magnitude (vs time) graph on page 480, determine how many times delta Cephei is at brightest than when it is faintest (on this and all future parts, make sure you show me what you did; do not just announce the answer) b) determine the period of delta cephei (the figure caption has an incorrect period) and use it to determine the average luminosity (it's a log scale! treat accordingly!) using the period-luminosity diagram on the adjacent page (delta Cephei is a type I cepheid); then use this luminosity (relative to the sun) to determine its average absolute magnitude c) finally, find the distance to delta Cephei 2) a) advanced question 19(40) AND also find the difference in the b) their apparent magnitudes c) their absolute magnitudes 3) the 4th-brightest appearing (and nearby) star in the sky, alpha centauri, is actually a double star with components cleverly named A and B.... the stars are so close that they cannot be seen indiviudally by the eye... using the data in Appendix 4, find the apparent magnitude of the combined light of the alpha Centauri AB system |
||||
|
|
|
|
|
the eclipsing binary applet |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Oldest
rocks on Earth? and here's the real article |
Major Hubble Failure to delay shuttle mission |
|
|
astro pages for august 2008