Introduction

The Assignments

• For Thursday February 21st - Use any available source, including the internet (any search engine will do), to find the following
• Definition of an Astronomical Unit (AU)
• Definition of a Light Year (lyr)
• The number of miles in an AU, and the number of meters in an AU
• The number of miles in a lyr, and the number of meters in a lyr
• The distance to the nearest star (except for the Sun) in lyr
• The size (diameter) of the Milky Way galaxy in lyr
• The distance to the Andromeda galaxy, in lyr
• How to convert between units
• (Note: this quiz will be open notes)
• Quiz Answers
• For Thursday February 28th
• Textbook Section 2-5 Eclipses
• Online notes on the phases of the Moon
• (Notes: This quiz will be closed notes. Be prepared to draw diagrams similar to the one in the online notes)
• For Thursday March 6th
• Constellation presentations - no quiz this week
• For Thursday March 13th
• Textbook Chapter 3
• The works of
• Copernicus
• Galileo
• Brahe
• Kepler
• Newton
• For Thursday March 20th
• The next two reading assignments will be from the chapter on telescopes, which I will not be covering in class
• Textbook Chapter 4 sections 1 and 2
• For Thursday April 3rd
• Textbook Chapter 4 sections 3, 4, and 5
• For Thursday April 10th
• Textbook Chapter 6 pages 110 through 113
• The Hertzsprung Russel (H-R) diagram.
• Look for
• Which properties are being plotted
• Main sequence stars
• White Dwarf stars
• Red Giants
• Red Super giants
• Blue Giants
• For Thursday April 17th
• Textbook Chapter 5, leaving out section 5-4
• Look for definitions and explanations of the following
• sunspots
• photosphere
• chromosphere
• corona
• prominence
• granulation
• solar flare
• aurora
• magnetic cycle
• For Thursday April 24th
• Textbook Chapter 7, section 1
• Look for definitions and explanations of the following
• Conservation of Mass
• Conservation of Energy
• Hydrostatic Equilibrium
• Energy Transport
• Radiation
• Convection
• Conduction
• For Thursday May 1st
• The easiest source for this assignment is to search online
• Look for definitions and explanations of the following
• Element
• Isotope
• Nucleus
• Proton
• Electron
• Neutron
• Electrostatic force
• Nuclear reactions
• For Thursday May 15th
• Galaxies - Textbook chapters 9 and 10
• You can also try online sources
• Look for the following
• What is a galaxy?
• Approximate size of Milky Way galaxy
• Approximate number of stars in Milky Way galaxy
• Nuclear Bulge, Galactic Disk, and Halo. Star clusters
• Spiral, Elliptical, and Irregular Galaxies - examples of each
• Galactic Rotation
• Hubble Law
• Colliding Galaxies