Astronomy 622 : Cosmology
Spring 2012
 |
The evolution of the universe from the "Big Bang" to the formation of stars and galaxies.
Schedule
Instructor: Massimo Ricotti
Class: room CSS 0201
Lectures: Tuesday & Thursday
2:00pm to 3:15pm
First class: Thursday Jan 26
Last class: Thursday May 10
Final exam: Wednesday May 16
(10:30am-12:30pm)
Contact Info
If you need help or have questions you can reach me here
- Office: room CSS 0213
- E-mail: ricotti at astro dot umd dot edu
- Phone: (301) 405 5097
- Office hours: any time ... stop by or send me an e-mail to arrange a meeting
- Class web page: http://www.astro.umd.edu/~ricotti/teaching/ASTR622-12.html
Scanned Notes of the Course
I have scanned my handwritten notes and published them in PDF format. In order to avoid creating files that are too large I have created 7 separate files.
Course Description
Part I: Linear Universe - 19 lectures.
- Era of ``non-standard'' particle physics: Friedman-Leimatrie cosmology, Hubble law, redshift, inflation, perturbations from inflation, reheating and baryogenesis
- Era of ``standard'' particle physics: Kinetic theory in the expanding universe, equilibrium thermodynamic, neutrino decoupling, non-baryonic matter, thermal history, primordial nucleosynthesis, CMB spectrum, recombination and decoupling, linear growth of cosmological perturbations
- CMB anisotropies: linear theory
Part II: Non-linear Universe (extragalactic astronomy) - 9 lectures
- CMB: beyond linear theory, measuring cosmological parameters
- Large scale structure and galaxy formation: Top-hat collapse, large scale structure formation (simulations and theory), Press-Schechter formalism, first stars and galaxies, Lyman-alpha forest and reionization, density profile of dark matter halos, unsolved problems.
Textbooks
- Strongly Recommended:
- "Cosmology" by Peter Cole and Francesco Lucchin
- Nice book on Inflation and high-energy universe (first part of the course) :
- "Cosmological Inflation and Large-Scale Structure" by Andrew R. Liddle, David H. Lyth
Course Grading
There will be one in-class Midterm exam, a term project and a Final. Class participation and attendance is strongly encouraged. The grade will be determined according to the following weights:
- Homework 30%
- Term project 20%
- Midterm Exam 20%
- Final Exam 30%
- Final exam Wednesday, May 16 (10:30am-12:30pm)
Letter Grades
A+ > 96% A 91.5%-96% A- 87.5%-91.5% B+ 83.5%-87.5% B 79%-87.5% B- 75%-79% C+ 71%-75% C 66.5%-71% C- 62.5%-66.5% D < 62.5%
Syllabus
You can download the Syllabus in pdf format Syllabus.pdf or read the html version Syllabus.html
.Lectures, homework and term project:
During the semester I will hand out 4-5 homework. Each of you will write a review paper or a web page on a cosmology topic of your choice. At the end of the semester you will give a short presentation.
Homework
- Homework#1 (due Feb 23rd)
- Homework#2 (due March 8th)
- Homework#3 (due April 12th)
- Homework#4 (due April 26th)