GALAXIES AND THE UNIVERSE - 2010

Times and Locations

Lectures   Tuesday 1:00 pm to 2:30 pm R S205
AND
Thursday 1:00 pm to 2:30 pm R S205

Professor

Name Dr. M. McCall
Office 128 Petrie (morning), 334 Petrie (afternoon)
Office Hours Wednesday, 2:30 pm to 3:30 pm
Thursday, 2:30 pm to 3:30 pm
Phone 416-736-5249 (Physics and Astronomy Office)
416-736-2100 x 33773 (Personal Office)
Email mccall@yorku.ca
Website http://www.yorku.ca/mccall

Introduction

WELCOME TO "GALAXIES AND THE UNIVERSE". This is the second offering in the astronomy stream of the undergraduate programme of the Department of Physics and Astronomy. It is designed to give you your first serious look at galaxies and a brief introduction to the basics of cosmology. In the past 30 years, there has been a revolution in research in these areas, primarily as a result of developments in detector technology. Besides laying down fundamentals, the course will attempt to familiarize you with current issues, many of which are at the frontier of human scientific endeavour.


Pre-requisites

This is a second course in astronomy intended primarily for science majors. Therefore, you are expected to have background in physics and astronomy equal to that offered by PHYS 1070 (Astronomy). The course is not highly mathematical, but on occasion you will be expected to be familiar with basic concepts in calculus, especially differentiation. You should be intimately familiar with logarithms. It is expected also that you have some familiarity with computers. If you lack any of this knowledge, you will need to demonstrate to your professor why you should be allowed to take the course.


Format of the Course

Lectures Two 90-minute lectures each week for one semester.
Attendance at the lectures is highly recommended, because the professor greatly enhances the material covered in the text book, and often covers material which is not in the text. Some notes will be provided during the lectures, but no notes will be posted on the web. There is no official laboratory component, but there will be one assignment which will be lab-like.

Rough Outline of Lectures

Below is given a rough outline of the general topics to be covered in the course.

  1. Stellar Properties Relevant to Studies of Galaxies
    H-R Diagram; Star Clusters; Mass and Luminosity; Age; Evolution; Supernovae; White Dwarfs; Pulsars; Black Holes; Variables; Standard Candles.

  2. Normal Galaxies
    Milky Way; Stellar Populations; How Galaxies were Discovered; What Galaxies Are; Morphology; Stars, Gas, and Dust; Internal Motions and Implications for Mass; Dark Matter; Distances.

  3. Peculiar Galaxies
    Morphological Distinction; Interactions; Nuclear Activity; Quasars.

  4. Organization of Galaxies
    Hierarchical Clustering; Morphological Segregation; Nature versus Nurture; Changes in Galaxies with Redshift; Gravitational Lensing.

  5. Formation and Evolution of Galaxies
    Formation and Evolution of Structure; Mergers; Flows; Waves; Chemistry.

  6. Cosmology
    Olbers' Paradox; The Redshift; Hubble's Law; Hubble's Constant; The Cosmic Microwave Background; The Cosmological Principle; The Scale Factor; Density Parameters; Geometry; Dark Matter; Dark Energy; The Big Bang.

Text Book

The textbook for this course is the same as used in PHYS 1070, namely Universe, Eighth Edition, by R. A. Freedman and W. J. Kaufmann III (W. H. Freeman).


Additional References

General

Galaxies and the Universe

Workload

You will be required to complete several assignments and one major observational project. The project will require extensive use of computers. In addition, there will be a mid-term and a final exam. For the project, you will be required to observe with a partner or partners at night with one of the York Observatory telescopes. In principle, the observing can be completed in one night. You will have most of the term to complete the project as a whole. To help you make steady progress on the project, milestones are defined which will require completion of preparatory tasks by specific deadlines.
Students are expected to have mature work habits, meaning that they should be able to work both independently and in small groups and meet a deadline without undue pressure from an instructor.
LATE ASSIGNMENTS OR PROJECTS WILL NOT BE ACCEPTED!!!
Students who, due to exceptional circumstances, miss an exam might be allowed to make it up provided that they notify the Professor of the problem in advance of the scheduled time of the exam and provided that adequate documentation is produced subsequently to explain the circumstances forcing the absence.

Grading

Item %
Coursework Assignments 25.0
Observational Project Assignments 10.0
Observational Project 15.0
Mid-term Exam 15.0
Final Exam 35.0
Total 100.0
In individual cases, this grading scheme may be altered to take account of exceptional circumstances, such as an illness or death in the family. Such exceptional circumstances will require documentation to show they are genuine.

Offences Against Academic Honesty

Cheating, whether in the form of copying during tests, using another person's work as one's own, using unauthorized aids, plagiarism, buying of essays, impersonation of another student, and aiding and abetting of such conduct are all prohibited and, if detected, will result in certain penalties, possibly including prosecution under the Criminal Code of Canada.

Course Dates

First Lecture Jan. 5
Reading Break Feb. 15-19
Mid-Term Exam Feb. 23
Drop Deadline Mar. 8
Last Lecture Apr. 1
Final Exam Between Apr. 7 and Apr. 23

Observing Project Milestones

Project Assignment 1   Jan. 14
Project Assignment 2 Jan. 14
Project Assignment 3 Jan. 21
Project Assignment 4 Jan. 28
Project Assignment 5 Feb. 4
Project Assignment 6 Feb. 11
Project Assignment 7 Feb. 11


File translated from TEX by TTH, version 3.38.
On 29 Dec 2009, 16:16.