Roberto J. Avila
Office: Astronomy 212
Phone: (505) 646-3000
Email: ravila
(append "@nmsu.edu")
| Office hours:
Wednesday: 12:00 to 1:00 pm
or by appointment
|
|
Welcome to Astronomy 110. I am your friendly cruise director for this lab, I will try not to bore you during the semester if you promise to pay attention and not quit whenever you see manipulation of fractions in any assignment.
In this page you will find useful information and links.
Class syllabus
Grades
While TAing this course I have seen a large dispersion in the quality of the summaries submitted by students. I purposely do not give specific instructions about formats or style for these summaries and I wish to continue with this custom. In order to help my students more clearly understand what I am looking for, I am providing two sample summaries, a good and a bad.
Good summary
Bad summary
Schedule
Here it is:
| Week |
Date |
Lab Assignment |
Assigment due |
| 1 |
August 29 |
Lab introduction (Lab 1) |
|
2 |
September 5 |
Moon lab (lab 2) |
Lab introduction (Lab 1) |
| 3 |
September 12 |
Geology of terrestrial planets (lab 4) |
Moon lab (lab 2) |
| 4 |
September 19 |
Comets and asteroids (lab 3) |
Geology of terrestrial planets (lab 4) |
| 5 |
September 26 |
Kepler's laws and gravitation (lab 6) |
Comets and asteroids (lab 3) |
| 6 |
October 3 |
Orbit of Mercury (lab 7) |
September observatory notebook
Kepler's laws and gravitation (lab 6) |
| 7 |
October 10 |
Parallax (lab 8) |
Orbit of Mercury (lab 7) |
| 8 |
October 17 |
Mapping the Galaxy (lab 13) |
Parallax (lab 8) |
| 9 |
October 24 |
The Sun (lab 11) |
Mapping the Galaxy (lab 13) |
| 10 |
October 31 |
Spectroscopy (lab 10) |
The Sun (lab 11) |
| 11 |
November 7 |
H-R Diagram (lab 12) |
October observatory notebook
Spectroscopy (lab 10) |
| 12 |
November 14 |
Galaxy Morphology (lab 14) |
H-R Diagram (lab 12) |
| 13 |
November 21 |
NO CLASSES! |
|
| 14 |
November 28 |
Hubble Law (lab 17) |
Galaxy Morphology (lab 14) |
| 15 |
December 5 |
Review |
November observatory notebook
Hubble Law (lab 17) |
Campus Observatory
You are required to attend campus observatory once a month during the semester. Each month you will observe 4 objects and write down some information about them. Each time you go to observatory bring 4 copies of the observation sheets located in the back of the lab manual. Once you have viewed your four objects make sure to get your sheets stamped by the observatory TAs. I will not accept your work without this stamp.
The observatory will be open Mondays and Thursdays of each week
beginning Thursday, September 6 and ending Thursday, November 29. Opening time will be 8pm. Observatory will not be open during Thanksgiving Break.
Since we have optical telescopes at the campus observatory, we cannot see through clouds or rain. Therefore, if you look up in the sky and cannot see any stars, chances are the telescopes cannot see any either. In such cases, the observatory will be closed for the night. If you are unsure whether the observatory is open or not, you can either check the observatory homepage or call the observatory recording at 646-6278. Both of these will be updated about an hour before observatory begins, and again if the observatory closes part way through the night.
Campus Observatory
Links
Astronomy Picture of the Day
Page last updated December 5, 2007
