Astronomy 311
Nebular Astrophysics
Vanderbilt University
Fall, 2005
MWF 1:10-2:00, SC 6105
Prof. Rob Knop
SC 6912
2-6165
r.knop@vanderbilt.edu
The Final
The final has two components: a group component and a solo component. You must complete and turn in the group component before downloading the solo component. Your group will turn in a single set of solutions for the group component, and will all receive the same grade for that component. Discuss the group problems only with people in your group (and with Rob and/or Rachel).
The whole final is due Friday, December 16.
The Groups
- Katie & Sonali
- Erin & Kent & Julia
- Chris & Davon
- Billy & Yilen & Phil-or-whoever-that-short-haired-guy-is
- Alicia & Hugo & Tommy
- Rob & Rachel
Misc. Handouts and Such
2005/12/07: Lecture slides in OpenOffice.org Impress and in PDF format.
2005/11/04 (and later days too): Lecture slides in OpenOffice.org Impress and in PDF format.
2005/10/26: Euler Notebook. This is just a plain text file. Save this to disk and read it into Euler if you want to muck about with it.
2005/10/19: Lecture slides in OpenOffice.org Impress and in PDF format.
2005/09/23: Lecture slides in OpenOffice.org Impress and in PDF format.
2005/09/09: Lecture slides in OpenOffice.org Impress and in PDF format.
2005/08/24: Gas Clouds I Have Known: Openoffice.Org Impress and PDF format.
Homework
- Problem Set 1, due at the beginning of
class on Friday, September 9;
Rob's Solutions — Rachel's Solutions
- Problem Set 2, due Wed. Oct 5.
Rachel's Solutions
- Problem Set 3, due Fri. Oct 14.
Rob's Solutions — Rachel's Solutions
- Problem Set 4, due Mon. Nov 7.
Solutions — RAchel's Solutions
- Problem Set 5, due Fri. Nov 18. Rachel's Solutions
- Numerical Problem Set, due
Wed. Dec 7. Solutions to some of this are in Osterbrock Figure
2.4.
Here is some sample perl code that shows you some basics of perl and PDL.
In-Class Group Problems
- 2005/09/28.
- 2005/10/14, and solutions to problem 1. (For problem 2:
harder ionizing spectrum or higher O-abundance.)
- 2005/10/21, and solutions.
- 2005/11/11, and solutions.
Textbook
There are two textbooks for the course. Both should be in the bookstore, but below I link to the books' amazon.com pages for your convenience.
- Osterbrock, Astrophysics of Gaseous Nebulae and Active Galactic Nuclei, 1989 (amazon.com). Note that there is a new edition of this book, by Osterbrock & Ferland, coming out this fall. We'll be using the 1989 edition, but I have asked the library to order a couple of copies of the new edition and put them on reserve.
Spitzer, Physical Processes in the Interstellar Medium (amazon.com).
Course Goals and Overview
The primary goals of this course are two-fold:
- To learn about the physical processes of nebulae
Of course, there are people who spend their lives trying to do that, so we're not going to do it all. The goal is to have some knowledge of our current understanding of how things work and what goes on in interstellar gas. As laboratories for the physical processes, we'll be focusing primarily on: ionized gas around hot young stars, planetary nebuae, active galactic nuclei. To a smaller extent, we will focus on neutral and molecular gas in the interstellar medium, and shocks in supernova remnants. This is not an exhaustive list of interesting gas clouds in the Universe (ask Sonali about gas clouds around young stars, for example), but will serve as places to allow us to understand the sorts of physical processes that are relevant.
- To learn about how we figured all of that out
An equally important goal of the course is to understand the theoretical and observational techniques and diagnostics we use in order to figure out what's going on in these gas clouds. These are the foundations of the research tools used by astronomers who look at or think about diffuse gas in space. To this end, we'll be doing drive-by treatments of radiative transfer, free-free and synchrotron radiation, atomic and molecular physics, and fluid and plasma physics. Obviously, we won't do a full treatment of any of those topics, but we will go through some of the important concepts as they are applied to the study of astrophysical nebulae.
Grading
In the interest of fairness, everybody will get a D.
No, just kidding.
Grading will be primarily based on homework assignments. Homework will be assigned approximately every other week. Each homework assignments will have "group" and "solo" problems. Group problems may be done any way you wish. You may talk with other people and work with other people while doing them– however, you should make sure that the final solution you give is yours, and that you understand what you're doing. Solo problems are your take-home midterms (although they'll just be graded as normal homework problems). You may not speak with anybody other than me about solo problems. You may, however, use any books or resources you want to use in figuring them out.
One of the homework assignments will be a computational project in which you numerically solve a problem.
There will also be a final exam, whose format is yet to be determined.
Grading will be 75% homework, 25% final exam.
Course Schedule
Below are listed reading assignments. Ideally, you will want to do the reading before the lecture in question, but I've been around the block enough times to know how likely that is. In any event, it tells you the material in the book that supports and complements the main things we'll be talking about in class. I won't always cover everything from the reading assignments in gory detail, because you can get them from the book. However, if there are things from it that you think might be important but which aren't clear, please do not hesitate to ask about them. We can spend class time talking about the things that are less clear or more difficult.
This schedule is subject to change; I suspect as we get a few weeks into the course, we'll find that we're no longer on schedule.
Rescehdling: I am going to be out of town at two different times during the semester. I'll have to miss Tuesday, Nov. 2 (which Rachel will take), and the four classes after Thanksgiving (Nov 28, Nov 30, Dec 2, and Dec 5). At some point early in the semester, I would like to find a time when we can schedule make-up periods for these five class periods.
Schedule Version 1
| Date | Topic | Reading |
|---|---|---|
| Wed, Aug 24 | Stretcing Excercise; Gas Clouds I Have Known | Dickens, "A Tale of Two Cities" |
| Fri, Aug 26 | Overview of the ISM | Spitzer Chap. 1 |
| Mon, Aug 29 | Overview of Spectroscopy & Photometry | – |
| Wed, Aug 31 | Radiative Transfer | Spitzer Chap 3-3.4 (p. 32-57) |
| Fri, Sep 1 | " | " |
| Mon, Sep 5 | " | " |
| Wed, Sep 7 | " | – |
| Fri, Sep 9 | Blackbody Radiation | – |
| Mon, Sep 12 | Blackbody Radiation; Photometry | – |
| Wed, Sep 14 | Optical Depth | – |
| Fri, Sep 16 | Stellar Evolution; Dust Extinction | Spitzer Chap 7-7.3 (p. 149-164); Osterbrock Chap 7.1-7.2 (p. 202-210) |
| Mon, Sep 19 | Atomic Orbitals & Emission Processes | – |
| Wed, Sep 21 | " | – |
| Fri, Sep 23 | Molecular Orbitals & Emission Processes | – |
| Mon, Sep 26 | " | – |
| Wed, Sep 28 | Catching up | – |
| Fri, Sep 30 | " | – |
| Mon, Oct 3 | Temperature Diagnostics | Osterbrock Sec. 3.5 (p. 53-65); Spitzer 4.1 (p. 70-87); Osterbrock Chap. 5-5.5 (p. 118-137) |
| Wed, Oct 5 | " | " |
| Fri, Oct 7 | Group Problems | " |
| Mon, Oct 10 | Summary to Date | (All of the above) |
| Wed, Oct 12 |
Density Diagnostics | Osterbrock Chap. 5.6-5.7 (p. 137-145) |
| Fri, Oct 14 2 hours |
" ; Group Problems | " |
| Mon, Oct 17 | Photoionization Equilibrium | Osterbrock Chap. 2; Spitzer Sec. 5.1-5.2 |
| Wed, Oct 19 | " | " |
| Fri, Oct 21 | Group Problems | " |
| Mon, Oct 24 | Fall Break | – |
| Wed, Oct 26 | HII Regions | " |
| Fri, Oct 28 2 hours |
HII Regions | " |
| Mon, Oct 31 | Solving Numerical Problems | – |
| Wed, Nov 2 | Free-free Emission (Rachel) | – |
| Fri, Nov 4 2 hours |
Heating and Cooling | Osterbrock Chap. 3; Spitzer Chap. 6 |
| Mon, Nov 7 | Fluid Dynamics | Osterbrock Chap 6.; Spitzer Chap. 10 |
| Wed, Nov 9 | " | " |
| Fri, Nov 11 2 hours |
" ; Group Problems | " |
| Mon, Nov 14 | Expansion of HII Regions | "; Spitzer Chap. 12 |
| Wed, Nov 16 | " | " |
| Fri, Nov 18 2 hours |
Synchrotron radiation ; Shocks | |
| Mon, Nov 21 | Thanksgiving Break | – |
| Wed, Nov 23 | Thanksgiving Break | |
| Fri, Nov 25 | Thanksgiving Break | – |
| Mon, Nov 28 | Class cancelled | Shakespeare, Hamlet |
| Wed, Nov 30 | Class cancelled | Stoppard, Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead |
| Fri, Dec 2 | Class cancelled | Garcia-Marquez, One Hundred Years of Solitude |
| Mon, Dec 5 | Class cancelled | Adams, The Hitch-Hikers Guide to the Galaxy and sequels |
| Wed, Dec 7 | Shocks & Supernova Remnants | – |