Reading/Listening Assignments for Astro 250

• The week of April 28 (SETI and the End of the World)
  • Chelyabinsk: Article 9 on Blackboard
  • The Fate of the Earth: S&T Article number 10 on Blackboard
  • The Fate of the Sun and the Earth: S&T Article number 11 on Blackboard
  • The Future of the Universe: S&T Article number 12 on Blackboard

• The week of April 21 (Life, and SETI)
  • Reading #7 in Blackboard: Exoplanets Everywhere (Sara Seager)
  • Reading #8 in Blackboard: Life in the Universe section: SETI Searches Compared
  • Explore the website from the PBS Series on Life Beyond Earth
  • Listening: Big Picture Science: Will Aliens Speak Math?
  • Listening: Are We Alone: Hollywood Aliens: What's Right and What's Wrong

• The week of April 14 (Life in the Universe)
  • Unveiling Distant Worlds - S&T Article #2 in the ET section of Blackboard
  • Browse this poster about the details of defining the "habitable zone" - it is in PDF format.
  • For more details on the habitable zone, see this paper by Franck et al..
  • (audio) In Our Time: ET - New Life within our Solar System

• The week of April 7 (Life in the Universe)
  • The Chance of Finding Aliens - S&T Article #1 in the Extraterrestrial Life section of Blackboard
    
    • Also available on the S&T website
  • A blog post on defining "life" written by Brian May (of Queen fame).
  • Unveiling Distant Worlds - S&T Article #2 in the ET section of Blackboard
  • Browse this poster about the details of defining the "habitable zone" - it is in PDF format.
  • For more details on the habitable zone, see this paper by Franck et al..

• The week of March 24 and 31 (Cosmology)
  • Dark Matter and Galaxy Rotation Curves
  • Sizing up Inflation: S&T Article #4 available on Blackboard
  • Universe in a Box: Article #2 on Blackboard, Cosmology section
  • Supernovae, Cosmic Yardsticks: S&T Article #5
  • Dark Energy and the Preposterous Universe: S&T Article #6

• The week of March 10 (Cosmology)
  • Start with: Cosmology in the New Millenium: Article by Turner and Freedman available through Blackboard in Section 3: Cosmology
  • An excellent online cosmology tutorial - we'll use material from this throughout the Cosmology section, so start working through it.
  • The ideas behind "freeze-out", from Davison Soper at the University of Oregon.
  • A concise review of Big Bang nucleosynthesis, from Ned Wright at UCLA

• The week of March 3 (Time Travel)
  • Listening: Time Travel at the Movies: a light-hearted discussion hosted by Neil De Grasse Tyson about what movies get right (and wrong) when doing time travel. Part of his Star Talk Radio series.
  • How to Build a Time Machine, by Paul Davies (Scientific American, September 2002)
  • Wormholes and Time Machines: article by Paul Davies, both on Blackboard in Section 2: Relativity and Time Travel
  • What is a wormhole?
  • Another view from Michael Shermer
  • optional: this episode of Are We Alone? has a part-whimsical, part-techical overview of time, time travel, and our perception of time. Particularly good are the chats with Roy Gould and Simon Steel

• The week of February 24 (Black Holes to Time Travel)
  • "Double Pulsar: Einstein's Ultimate Laboratory" - article on the Blackboard Astro 250 site in Section 2 - Relativity and Time Travel
  • other evidence of warped space
  • black holes and curved spacetime
  • Death by Black Hole, an interview with Dr. Neil de Grasse Tyson... or if you prefer video, here's a video of Neil talking about it. There are other ways that astronomy can kill you - his whole talk covers those too...
  • How to Build a Time Machine, by Paul Davies (Scientific American, September 2002)
  • Wormholes and Time Machines: article by Paul Davies, both on Blackboard in Section 2: Relativity and Time Travel

• The week of February 17, general relativity and black holes. Resources for GR:
  • The main reading is this book excerpt from Jose Wudka on general relativity and black holes
  but see also
  • the Equivalence Principle,
  • curved spacet ime
  • and black holes and curved spacetime
  • and evidence of warped space

• The week of February 10 (relativity - special to general)
  • The radio show In Our Time: Relativity gives a nice overview with input from Sir Martin Rees, Roger Penrose, & Ruth Gregory. If you'd prefer to download the mp3 you can do that here.
  • An excellent introduction to Special Relativity is here, in particular:
    • Inertial Frames
    • What is Stationary?
    • Invariance of the speed of light
    • Is it true?
    • Time Dilation
  • Here is another nice tutorial on the basics of relativity: in particular the Preface, Primeval Relativity, through Special Relativity
  • For a quick summary, see online 'Astronomy Notes' on Spacetime

• The week of February 3 (Neutron stars, gamma ray bursts, and relativity)
  • Neutron stars:
    • Web reading: Jocelyn Bell on the Discovery of Pulsars
    • Article: Taking the pulse of neutron stars
    • Book review: Dragon's Egg
  • Gamma Ray Bursts
    • Article: The Link Between Gamma Ray Bursts and Supernovae
    • Website to accompany "Death Star" - program on gamma-ray bursts
    • See the NASA page on hypernovae for some interesting animations.
  • ... and looking ahead to special relativity:
    • Here is a nice tutorial on the basics of relativity
    • For more and diffent info, see online 'Astronomy Notes' on relativity

• The week of January 27 (Supernovae...)
  • Article: Illuminating Dark Energy w/ Supernovae (through p. 276, and box "Types of Supernovae" on p. 277)
  • Article: Anatomy of a Supernova
  • Article: The Supernova Menace (for fun!)
  • Web reading: Jocelyn Bell on the Discovery of Pulsars
  • Article: Taking the pulse of neutron stars
  • Book review: Dragon's Egg

• The week of January 20 (into the week of the 27th)
  • Article (two parts): The Elements of Life I and II: on the Blackboard for this course, in Section 1 - Stars Bizarre.
  • Article: From Here to Eternity
  • Article: White Dwarf Stars
  • Article: Illuminating Dark Energy w/ Supernovae (through p. 276, and box "Types of Supernovae" on p. 277)
  • Article: Anatomy of a Supernova

• The week of January 13 (Stars Bizarre)
  • Reading:
    • Iben: The Lives of Stars: From Birth to Death and Beyond
    • Article (two parts): The Elements of Life I and II: on the Blackboard for this course, in Section 1 - Stars Bizarre.
    • Optional: Cosmic Catastrophes, pp. 1-16.
  • Listening:
    • The Life Cycle of Stars from In Our Time - look for "Listen Now" within that link for the audio stream