Spring 2008
Breaking News
January 24: Asteroid TU24 makes close pass (1.4x distance to the Moon) by Earth.
February 4: Movie of asteroid TU24 passing the Earth.
February 6: Amateur high resolution images of artificial satellites by Ron Dantowitz.
Amateur high resolution image of USA 193 - secret failed military satellite.
More about USA 193.
The Large Hadron Collider (particle accelerator) and mini black holes.
February 20: Total Lunar Eclipse.
February 22: Some local pictures of the total lunar eclipse.
February 27: "Double Sledgehammer" attack planned for Moon by NASA.
March 3: Landslide seen in progress on Mars.
April 11: Two great websites!
Comparison of sizes (thanks Brandon!)
Another comparison of sizes (thanks Jason!)
April 12: Yuri's Night.
Instructor: Paul Thomas
Office: Phillips 241
Phone: 36-3615
E-mail: thomaspj@uwec.edu
Office Hours:
M Tu F 9.00 am - 11.00 am, M Tu W F 2.00 pm - 3.00 pm
Materials:
The UW-Eau Claire Baccalaureate degree provides students with the knowledge and abilities needed for lifelong learning. This course helps achieve these goals by helping students gain:
1. an understanding of a liberal education
2. an appreciation of the University as a learning community
3. an ability to inquire, think, and analyze
4. an ability to read, write, speak, and listen
5. an understanding of numerical data
6. a historical consciousness
7. an understanding of science and the scientific method
Physics 115 Night Observing for May 8 is CANCELLED
due to clouds.
Interesting Web Pages:
Spring 2008
The sky: what do we observe and what does it mean?
1. Sky motions and patterns; seasons; the celestial sphere; (Chapter 1-1, 2).
2. Planetarium; the Moon: eclipses and phases (Chapter 6-1, 2, 3, 4).
How did astronomers figure out that the Earth orbited the Sun?
3. What is the scientific method? What is a model? (Chapter 1-3, 4) Testing different theories; the geocentric and heliocentric models (Chapter 2-2, 3) and Galileo’s challenge (Chapter 3-1); Kepler’s laws (Chapter 2-4, 5, 6); Isaac Newton (Chapter 3-2, 3, 4, 5).
4. Earth and Moon (Chapter 6-5, 6, 7, 8). Mercury, Venus, Mars; missions to Mars; life on Mars? (Chapter 8).
5. The Jovian planets and their satellites. (Chapter 9).
Could humanity be destroyed by an asteroid or a comet?
6. Meteors, asteroids, comets; comets and the origins of water and life on Earth (Chapter 10).
7. The Kuiper Belt and the Oort Cloud (Chapter 10-5); Pluto as a KBO; Tunguska and the Barringer crater (Chapter 10-6).
How do we know so much about stars by studying starlight?
8. Light; blackbody radiation; spectroscopy (Chapter 4); telescopes and observatories (Chapter 5).
9. The Hertzsprung-Russell diagram; mass, distances and temperatures of stars (Chapter 12).
Do planets orbit around other stars (and is there life on them)?
10. The Primitive Solar Nebula (PSN). The discovery of extrasolar planets (Chapter 7-7). SETI and life elsewhere (Chapter 19).
Will the Sun stop shining one day?
11. The Sun (Chapter 11). Stellar evolution (Chapter 14).
What is the evidence that stars change?
12. White dwarfs and planetary nebulae; SN 1987A, pulsars and supernova remnants (Chapter 15).
13. The Milky Way; Population I and II stars. Galaxies (Chapter 17).
14. Distances to galaxies (Chapter 17-2). Evidence for dark matter (Chapter 17-3). Hubble’s Law (Chapter 17-2).
15. The Big Bang; the Cosmic Microwave Background; determining the Age of the Universe (Chapter 18).
16. Will the universe collapse on itself, or expand forever? (Chapter 18-5).
Final Exam: Wednesday, May 14 at 1.00 pm in Phillips 007
PowerPoint Slides From Class (links will be added as we cover the material)
Quizzes
