Astronomy 211 -- Calendar of Topics -- Winter 2009

See Assignments and Due Dates for more detailed information and link to course pack materials.

Sun Mon (80 min) Tues Wed (80 min) Thu Fri (110 min) Sat
28 29 30 31 Jan-1 2 3
4

5 Syllabus, misconceptions, celestial sphere

6 7 Reports on ancients; Planetarium (celestial motions) 8 9 Distance to Moon and Sun 10
11 12 Ptolemy, Copernicus; Planetarium (retrograde) 13 14 Changing size of Moon; phases of Moon and Venus 15 16 Frames of Reference Project 17
18 19 HOLIDAY Martin Luther King Jr. Day 20 21Frames of Reference; Galileo 22 23[planned]Galileo, Kepler, Newton, "Find g" [reality] Galileo, Kepler 24
25 26 [planned]Birth and evolution of stars; stellar evolution game [reality] Newton, "Find g" 27 28 [planned] Stellar evolution; Equivalence Principle [reality] Orbits, Einstein's gravity 29 30 Formation and Evolution of stars
Equivalence principle; Video: Black Holes the Ultimate Abyss (55 min)
31
Feb-1 2 Death of Stars; Black Holes; SMBH 3 4 Accessing your graded reading quizzes
*Midterm* - Take home. Due 9-Feb, 1:15 pm
5 6 Video: Beyond the Big Bang (90 min) + Discussion 7
8 9 Milky Way; galaxies 10 11 Large-Scale Structure; An Expanding Universe 12 13 Hubble's Law BRING LAPTOPS 14
15 16 HOLIDAY President's Day 17 18 Galaxies, galaxy formation, quasars; Look-back Time 19 20 Hubble Deep Field
Video: The Runaway Universe - Dark Energy
21
22 23 Dark Matter; Dark Energy 24 25 The First 3 Minutes 26 27Curvature of Space 28
Mar-1 2 No formal class
Drop-In Discussions on Talks
3 4Fate of the Universe 5 6 Video: The Elegant Universe + discussion 7
8 9 - Student Presentations 10 11 - Student Presentations 12 13 Student Presentations 14
15

16 Final Exam - open book, open notes; Exam due March 19, midnight.