| The Sky and the Earth |
Sep 5 |
Chap E.1 |
We get acquainted, and then start talking about how the Earth's motion
is reflected on the sky. |
| Earth, Sun, and Moon |
Sep 7 |
Chap E.2 - E.3 |
How the motion of the Earth and Moon are reflected on the sky. Also
check out the star charts at the end of the book, which will help with
your homework. |
| Planetary Motions |
Sep 12 |
Chap E.4 - E.5, and 1.1 - 1.3 |
The apparent motions of the planets in the sky, the Ptolemaic
system, Copernicus, Galileo, Brahe, and Kepler |
| Gravity |
Sep 14 |
Chap 1.4 and 5.2 |
EXTREMELY IMPORTANT! This lecture will contain the basis for
half of the rest of the course. You don't need to read about
Tidal Locking, but everything else is critical.
|
| Fundamentals of Light |
Sep 19 |
Chap 2.1 - 2.4, and 2.7 |
Again, very important. |
| Atoms and Light, and Telescopes |
Sep 21 |
Chap 2.5 - 2.6, and 3.1 - 3.5 |
The first part of this lecture (atoms and light) is extremely
important (and difficult). I'll go slow here. The stuff on telescopes
is mostly for fun, so don't spend much time on it. |
| Catch-Up & Review |
Sep 26 |
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A catch-up lecture to finish up topics. They'll be plenty of time
to you to ask questions, to prepare for the test. |
| EXAM |
Sep 28 |
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| Stellar Luminosities, Temperatures, and Radii |
Oct 3 |
Chap 10.1 - 10.5 |
Read this material carefully. It can be a bit complicated. |
| Stellar Masses and How the Sun Doesn't Work |
Oct 5 |
Chap 10.7 |
Another dense region, but pretty important. Incredibly, the
second half of the lecture isn't covered at all in the book, and what the
book does say (in Chap 9), is rather misleading. So you'll
need to pay close attention in class.
|
| Stellar Stucture and Evolution |
Oct 10 |
Chap 9.5 and 12.1 - 12.5 |
No book ever does this right. In order to make this make sense, I
have to merge material from the hydrogen fusion part of Chap 9 with
Chapter 12. Skip the stuff on Novae and Type I Supernovae for now.
|
| Neutron Stars, Black Holes, Relativity |
Oct 12 |
Box 4-1, Chap 13.1 - 13.2, and 13.5 - 13.7 |
Mind-boggling stuff. But don't worry if relativity gets you
confused. Everyone gets confused with it -- even astronomers. |
| Weird Binary Objects |
Oct 17 |
Chap 12.3 (on Novae), 12.5 (on Type Ia Supernovae),
13.3, and 13.8 (on Binary Systems)
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Now we'll talk about the weirdest objects in the universe. That
means collecting all the topics on binary stars that we've skipped.
If there is extra time, we'll also talk a bit about the stuff in
Chap 11 (how stars form), but just for the pretty pictures.
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| Catch-Up & Review |
Oct 19 |
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We'll finish off the topics that have run overtime, and then
review. |
| EXAM |
Oct 24 |
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| The Milky Way |
Oct 26 |
Chap 11.1 - 11.6, 12.6 - 12.7, 10.6, and 14.1 |
This lecture introduces the Milky Way galaxy via its interstellar medium,
star formation, and star clusters. That material is scattered over several
chapters of the book. Don't worry about the details of star formation
in Chap 11; it's the other stuff that's important.
|
| Our Galaxy and Others |
Oct 31 |
Chap 14.2 - 14.3, 14.5, and 15.1 |
One of the most fun parts of astronomy. There are a lot of pretty
pictures on the subject. |
| The Missing Mass, and Galaxy Formation
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Nov 2 |
Chap 14.4 - 14.6, and 16.1 - 16.3 |
I'm grouping together various measurements of galaxy mass, and
ideas about galaxy formation. This lecture will probably spill
over to next week.
|
| Introduction to Cosmology |
Nov 7 |
Chap 14.2, 15.2 - 15.3, and 17.1 - 17.3 |
We start the mind-boggling stuff. |
| The Big Bang Universe |
Nov 9 |
Chap 17.4 - 17.8 |
This material is difficult, but important. I'll do the best I
can to explain it. |
| Catch-up & Review |
Nov 14 |
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Another catch-up & review session in preparation for your test.
But if we're ahead of schedule, I'll talk about the stuff in
Chap 16 -- Big Black Holes and Active Galactic Nuclei. |
| EXAM |
Nov 16 |
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| Solar System Overview |
Nov 28 |
Chap 4.1 (and factoids from Chap 5 - 8) |
If you wish, you can also skim Chapters 5 through 8. Most of the
information is useless factoids, but I'll be hitting some of it
(particularly in the upcoming lectures).
|
| Formation of the Solar System |
Nov 30 |
Chap 4.3, 5.3, 6.3, 6.8, and 8.2 (Titan) |
I'll talk about the formation of the Solar System, the formation
(and evolution) of planets and their atmospheres. This connects
many of factoids that are presented in the chapters. The topic of
atmospheres will undoubtably spill over into the next lecture.
|
| Tides |
Dec 5 |
Chap 5.2, 8.1, and 8.4 |
After we finish with atmospheres, we'll talk about moons of Jupiter,
the rings of Saturn, and the Earth-Moon system. |
| Earth and Space |
Dec 7 |
Chap 9.4, 4.2, 5.7, and Box 7-1 |
Again, the material is scattered through many chapters of the book.
I'll be connecting things up. |
| Extra-Solar Planets |
Dec 12 |
Chap 4.4 |
This is a really new topic -- so new, that textbooks can't keep up with
the discoveries. I'll try to bring you up to date. |
| Life in the Universe and Review |
Dec 14 |
Chap 18 |
Are there are other civilizations out there? We'll start discuss the
possibilities from a couple different points of view. |