ASTRONOMY 3500. GALAXIES AND
COSMOLOGY
24. The Milky Way Galaxy: visual characteristics, models, interstellar extinction, dust and gas, general and differential star counts, morphology, the disk and age-metallicity relation, mass/light ratios, spiral structure, the bulge and Galactic centre region, the halo and globular cluster system, Galactic kinematics, local standard of rest, Oort constants, flat rotation curve, 21-cm mapping, distances from trigonometric parallaxes, cluster main-sequence fitting, moving cluster method, and statistical parallaxes.
25. The Nature of Galaxies: Hubble sequence, galaxy classification, spirals and irregulars, K-correction, isophotes and de Vaucouleurs profile, Tully-Fisher relation, mass/light ratios, metallicity gradients, X-ray luminosities, supermassive black holes?, globular cluster specific frequency, density wave models, non-linear effects, N-body simulations, elliptical galaxies, Faber-Jackson relation, relative numbers in the universe.
26. Galactic Evolution: interactions of galaxies, dynamical friction, ring galaxies, tidal tails, starburst galaxies, mergers in E and cDs, formation of galaxies, proposed models, explaining metallicity gradients, early universe.
27. The Structure of the Universe: extragalactic distance scale, expansion of the universe, Hubble Law, Hubble constant, Big Bang model, clusters of galaxies, the Local Group, Virgo cluster, Coma cluster, hot intracluster gas, superclusters, large-scale motions, voids and filaments, seeding the early universe.
28. Active Galaxies: Seyferts and active galaxies, radio galaxies, radio lobes and jets, quasars and qsos, unified model, probing the universe with quasars, gravitational lensing, Lyman-Alpha forest.
29. Cosmology: Olber’s paradox, cosmological principle, critical density, baryonic matter, density parameter, lookback time, cosmic microwave background, dipole asymmetry, Sunyaev-Zel’dovich effect, transition from radiation to matter eras, Big Bang nucleosynthesis, relativisitic cosmology, observational cosmology, supernova redshift-magnitude relation.
30. The Early Universe: fundamental particles, Planck limits, problems, the origin of structure.
LECTURES: Monday, Wednesday: 10:00-11:15, AT305
COURSE TEXTBOOK: An Introduction to Modern Astrophysics, Bradley W. Carroll & Dale
A. Ostlie, Addison-Wesley
GRADING SYSTEM:
| COURSE COMPONENT | PERCENTAGE OF GRADE |
| Assignments | 35% |
| Research Projects | 15% |
| Midterm Test (November) | 15% |
| Final Examination (December) | 35% |
| Total | 100% |
CALIBRATION TABLES (ignore those in textbook):
MILKY WAY FUNDAMENTAL PARAMETERS:
INTERSTELLAR REDDENING PARAMETERS:
EXAMPLE OF STATISTICAL PARALLAX:
INSTRUCTOR DIRECTIONAL REDDENING DEPENDENCE: