For readings from Carroll & Ostlie (big orange book), go here instead.

The following are readings from Ryden & Peterson (= RP = small blue book).


By Tuesday 1/22, please read:

• RP: Sections 3.1-3.3. All of this is review from Astro 7A (and related physics classes). You are not responsible for the derivations, but you should know how to use equations (3.42), (3.43), and (3.53).

By Thursday 1/24, please read:

• RP: Sections 4.2-4.3 on tides and the Roche limit.

By Tuesday 1/29, please read:

• RP: Sections 18.1-18.2 on white dwarfs and neutron stars. This is again review of Astro 7A.

By Thursday 1/31 (PS 1 due), please read:

• RP: Section 18.3-18.4, and Section 19.7 on tidal disruption near a black hole.

By Tuesday 2/5, please read:

• RP: Section 21.1 on AGN phenomenology.

By Thursday 2/7, please read:

• RP: Section 21.2.1 and 21.2.3 on accretion and accretion disks.

By Tuesday 2/12, please read:

• RP: Section 21.3 on reverberation mapping.

By Thursday 2/14, please read:

• RP: Section 21.4 on the growth of supermassive black holes.

By Tuesday 2/19, please read:

• RP: Appendix of Chapter 21: Superluminal motion.

By Thursday 2/21, please read:

• RP: Section 21.2.2 on the Eddington limit.

By Tuesday 2/26 and Thursday 2/28, please catch up on all the reading in preparation for the exam.

By Tuesday 3/5, please read:

• RP: Section 20.2, paying close attention to the application of the virial theorem (see section 3.4 for a derivation of the virial theorem).

By Thursday 3/7, please read:

• RP: Section 20.3 on the sphere of influence and Figure 20.10b on the M-sigma relation.

By Tuesday 3/12, please read:

• RP: Section 23.3 through page 538 on the equivalence principle and the bending of light in a gravitational field.

By Thursday 3/14, please read:

• Course handouts on gravitational lensing from Bradt's textbook, "Astrophysics Processes"

By Tuesday 3/19, please read:

• RP: Section 19.1, but do not worry too much about astronomical apparent and absolute magnitudes since these are just perverse (but sadly standard) ways of measuring flux. Focus instead on the layout of the Galaxy. Also section 19.2 on dark matter candidates.

By Thursday 3/21, please read:

• RP: Section 17.1 on star formation and the Jeans length.

For Spring Break:

• Please catch up on any reading or get a head start on future readings.

For Tuesday 4/2:

• RP: Section 19.5 but stop at Oort's first equation (19.37). Also all of section 19.6 on the tangent point method of measuring the rotation curve of the Galaxy.

For Thursday 4/4:

• RP: Section 22.1 on dark matter on the largest supercluster scales, and Section 22.2 on collision rates (the discussion of which is completely general). Note that while stars are collisionless, gas is collisional.

For Tuesday 4/9:

• RP: Section 20.4 on the distance ladder.

For Tuesday 4/16:

• RP: Section 20.5 on the Hubble law, and pages 526-527 on some particle physics jargon.

For Thursday 4/18:

• RP: Section 23.1 on Olbers's paradox through the top of page 531 (stop just before cosmic microwave background).

For Tuesday 4/23:

• RP: Finish the rest of Section 23.1 on the cosmic microwave background. Also Section 23.2 on the Friedmann equation.

For Thursday 4/25:

• RP: Pages 544 through 546 on the difference between comoving and proper distance, and the horizon distance. Also all of 23.5 and the various energy densities of the universe.

For Tuesday 4/30:

• RP: Sections 24.1 and 24.2.

For Thursday 5/2:

• RP: Sections 24.3 and 24.4.

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Last modified: Tue Aug 21 15:02:03 PDT 2012