Ay125   current syllabus (updated 5/21/09):

Week 1 (Mar 31):
     White dwarf structure and cooling; supernovae
     READING: RB, Ch. 4; ST, Chs. 3, 4, 18; L Chs. 15.1-3

Weeks 2-3 (Apr 6, 13):  
     Neutron-star structure, cooling, and phenomena
     (radii, cooling); radio pulsars, magnetars, and
     black-hole theory
     READING: RB, Ch. 5; ST, Chs. 9, 10, 11, 12; L, Chs. 15.4-6

Week 4 (Apr 20):
     Binary systems
     READING: FKR, Ch. 4.1-4; RB, Ch. 6; L, Chs. 14.6, 16.4-8; ST,
     Ch. 13 [The lectures/problems are most closely related to
     what is covered in FKR and RB.  The sections  in L and ST
     are related, but the mapping is not as precise.]

Week 5 (Apr 27):
     Spherical accretion and accretion disks
     READING: FKR, Chs. 2.5, 4.5-9, 5.1-7; ST, Ch. 14; L. 16.1-3

Week 6 (May 4):
     Cataclysmic variables and x-ray binaries
     READING: FKR, Chs 5.8-10 and Ch 6; RB, Ch 6.3; ST, Chs
     13-15; L Chs 15.5, 16.4, 16.5, 16.7

Week 7 (May 11):
     active galactic nuclei
     READING: RB, Ch. 8; FKR, Chs 7-9

Week 8 (May 18):
     More AGN; start gamma-ray bursts
     READING: RB, Ch. 7

Week 9 (May 25):
     more on gamma-ray bursts; Fermi acceleration, cosmic rays,
     ultra-high-energy cosmic rays and neutrinos
     READING: RB, Ch. 2.8; L, Ch. 21 (you may also wish to browse
     Chs. 18-20).




BOOKS:
RB=Rosswog and Bruggen
ST=Shapiro and Teukolsky
L=Longair


Subjects:
     LMXBs, HMXBs, CVs, microquasars, globular-cluster sources,
     GRBs (fireball, central sources, compactness problem),
     plerions, pulsar-wind nebulae, AGN (unification,
     broad/narrow lines, superluminal motions, jets, lobes,
     x-ray iron line broadening, Blandford-Znajek mechanism,
     hydromagnetic flows and jets, ULIRGs, blazars), x-ray
     bursters, dwarf novae,
     accretion onto neutron stars and white dwarfs, ADAFs,
     CDAFs, Sgr A*, soft x-ray transients, Fermi acceleration,
     ultra-high-energy cosmic rays, waxman-bahcall bound, ADIOS,
     gravitational-wave astrophysics, relativistic beaming,
     relativistic outflows (sedov-taylor), inverse-Compton
     catastrophe, momentum/energy driven winds, x-ray flashes

Detectors/observatories: