ASTR 202 -- Galactic Astronomy

Official course webpage

new Pick up marked Assignment 6 (and older unclaimed assignments) from the box ouside Hennings 332.

new Approximate list of material on the final exam pdf
Approximate list of material on the midterm exam pdf

Instructor: Ingrid Stairs
Meetings: MWF 12:00 - 12:50 pm in Hennings 202.
Office hours: Mondays 2:00 - 3:00 pm, Hennings 332
new Extra office hours during exam period: Thursday April 14, 11:00 - 12:00, Hennings 332
My homepage

Teaching Assistants:
Kristen Coppin
Office Hours: Tuesdays 2:00 - 3:00 pm, Hennings 310C
Robert Ferdman
Office Hours: Wednesdays 2:00 - 3:00 pm, Hennings 310D

Required text:
An Introduction to Modern Astrophysics
Bradley W. Carroll and Dale A. Ostlie
1996, Addison-Wesley
ISBN: 0201547309

Additional textbooks that may be interesting to those continuing in Astronomy:
Galaxies in the Universe -- This will be the required text for ASTR 303 next fall, but it also contains lots of information about our own galaxy.
Linda Sparke and John Gallagher
2000, Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 0521592410

Galactic Astronomy
James Binney and Michael Merrifield
1998, Princeton University Press
ISBN: 0691025657

Both the Carroll & Ostlie and Sparke & Gallagher books will be available on reserve in the library.

PDF files of the lecture notes and assignment solutions. Note that this is a password-protected area.

Approximate Course Outline:
Introduction: history of our understanding of the Milky Way, coordinate systems, basics of observational astronomy, review of properties of stars
Stellar populations: star counts, dust, extinction and reddening, stellar populations and evolution, star formation and initial mass function, globular and open clusters
Interstellar medium: multi-wavelength observations, differential rotation, distribution of gas
The Milky Way: kinematics of stars, bulge, disk, halo, Galactic centre, formation and evolution, Local Group of galaxies

Marking Scheme:
30% assignments (roughly every 2 weeks)
20% midterm to be held on Wednesday, Feb. 9
50% final (or 70% final if final better than midterm)

Assignment policies:
Many assignments will involve manipulation of data: plotting points, fitting simple functions, etc. These problems will be doable by hand, but students are encouraged to use computer programs (standard or personal software) to solve them.
Assignments will be due at the start of class on the due date. Late assignments will be penalized 20% for every day late (rounding up). Students may consult each other on the assignments, but each student must write up the problems in his/her own words.

Exams:
The midterm and final exams will contain a mixture of descriptive and quantitative questions.
Valid documentation (e.g. a doctor's note) must accompany any request to make up a missed exam.