Menu:

Teaching

Secrets of the Solar System Course

Lectures for the course Secrets of the Solar System - An introduction to Planetary Sciences, for the AMNH after-school program. The course is comprised by 8 lectures, downloadable below as pdf or open office format (Open Office is the open source generic of Microsoft Office). The course was offered to self-selected high-school students, the level is therefore that of a first-year college course. The scope is broad, covering many aspects of planetary sciences. The course was developed in collaboration with the astrophysics educator Brian Levine. The course continues to be taught at the Museum (click here for syllabus and course description). Although they have been mildly edited for content and style, the general outline still is this one, below, that we co-designed

  • Class 1   [pdf] [oo]
    • Origins
    • Tour of the Solar System

  • Class 2   [pdf] [oo]
    • History of Western Astronomy

  • Class 3   [pdf] [oo]
    • Seasons
    • Scales of the solar system
    • Orbits
      • Conic section
      • Energy

  • Class 4   [pdf] [oo]
    • The Sun
      • Differential rotation
      • Structure
      • Magnetic fields and flares
      • Chemical composition
    • The Solar Nebula
      • Chemistry
      • Snowline
      • Classes of planets

  • Class 5   [pdf] [oo]
    • Giant Planets
      • Planetary Rings
        • History
        • Tides
        • Roche limit
      • Interiors
        • Phase diagram
        • Liquid/Metallic interior

  • Class 6   [pdf] [oo]
    • Atmospheres of the Giant Planets
      • Bands and zones
      • Clouds
      • Storms
    • Terrestrial Planets
      • Atmospheres
      • Surfaces
    • Tidal Locking

  • Class 7   [pdf] [oo]
    • Satellites of the Outer Planets
      • Radius-density relation
      • Laplace resonance and Tidal heating
        • Io's volcanism
        • Europa's subsurface ocean
        • Cryovolcanism
      • Titan: Atmosphere and lakes
      • Enceladus' plumes
      • Iapetus equatorial ridge and hemisphere dicothomy
      • Triton: geysers and clouds
  • Class 8
    • Planet formation: ongoing research
  • Class 9 and 10
    • Students' mission planning and presentations