Astronomy 622 : Cosmology
Spring 2018
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The evolution of the universe from the "Big Bang" to the formation of stars and galaxies.
Schedule
Instructor: Massimo Ricotti
Class: room ATL 0201
Lectures: Tuesday & Thursday
2:00pm to 3:15pm
First class: Thursday Jan 25
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 PSC 1156
- 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/ASTR622-18.html
Syllabus
You can download the Syllabus in pdf format Syllabus.pdf
Textbooks
- Recommended:
- "Galaxy Formation and Evolution", by Mo, van den Bosch, White
- Nice general book I used in past classes:
- "Cosmology" by Peter Cole and Francesco Lucchin
- Nice book on Inflation and high-energy universe:
- "Cosmological Inflation and Large-Scale Structure" by Andrew R. Liddle, David H. Lyth
Scanned Notes of the Course
In addition to the textbook, I will make available (on ELMS) my handwritten notes and other notes and resources either provided by colleagues or published and available on the web. Useful resouces are also linked here.
Course Description
Part I: Linear Universe - 18 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) - 10 lectures
- Measuring cosmological parameters, dark matter and dark energy
- 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.
Homework, Exams and Term Project:
During the semester I will hand out 4-5 homework, a midterm and final exam (closed books). 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.
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 35%
- Term project 15%
- Midterm Exam 25%
- Final Exam 25%
- Final exam Wednesday, May 16 (10:30am-12:30pm)
Letter Grades
A+ > 97% A 94%-97% A- 90%-94% B+ 87%-90% B 84%-87% B- 80%-84% C+ 77%-80% C 74%-77% C- 70%-74% D < 70%