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Innovative Physics: Astrophysics
Innovative Physics: Connecting Physics to Industry
This is material from the CDROM produced by the Victorian Curriculum and Assessment Authority (VCAA) in partnership the Department of Innovation, Industry and Regional Development (DIIRD).
The author was Cameron Bell. The support of the following is acknowledged: Prof Matthew Bailes, Dr Chris Fluke, Dr Sarah Maddison and Stuart Gill from the Centre for Astrophysics and Supercomputing, Swinburne University of Technology; Keith Burrows, Melbourne Rudolf Steiner School.
Careers, Class Activities, Useful Websites
Careers
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Profile of Dr Sarah Maddison of Swinburne University who manages their Astronomy On Line course. | |||
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Career profile of Dr Stuart Gill from Swinburne University. | |||
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Dr Chris Fluke from Swinburne University on the benefits of being an astrophysicist. | |||
Class Activities
Documents for various aspects with relevant websites.
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439 kB | ||
A four page description of the Survey with images and diagrams. The websites below support the text. | |||
Edwin Hubble, Astronomer
A site exploring the life of the man who was first to show that the universe is expanding, and is considered by many to be the father of observational cosmology. In addition to biographical information and resources, the site has a gallery of photographs taken from the Hubble Space Telescope, which was so named in Edwin Hubble's honour.
SNAP: Supernova Accelerator Probe
The website for SNAP run by the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. Check Educators' section and gallery.
The 2dF Galaxy RedShift Survey
Includes the data, publications and images.
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403 kB | ||
A four page article on what cepheid variables are and the construction of the telescope. The websites below support the text. | |||
Inverse Square Law
Hyperphysics page illustrating the inverse square law.
Type 1 Supernova
Website that was the source of images of the mechanism for supernova type 1 explosion.
La Cumbres Observatory Global Network
Building a network of robotically controlled telescopes, check the education link.
Charles Sturt University Remote Telescope
This project is an initiative of Dr. David McKinnon, Associate Professor, Faculty of Education, Charles Sturt University Bathurst. The project delivers to primary and secondary schools learning packages developed for the curricula on Earth and Space.
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1.65 MB | ||
A two page document of developing a model of galaxy formation. The websites below support the text. | |||
The Hubble Space Telescope Site
A comprehensive site of images, discoveries, technology and education resources. Search on 'Galaxies'.
Useful Websites
General Resources - 2 Degree Field - Cepheid Variables - Galaxy Formation - Our Sun - SKA - Supercomputing - Virtual Milky Way - Visit Mars - Interviews
General Resources
Project CLEA
Project CLEA is a website devoted to developing laboratory exercise for high school students in modern astronomical techniques. Please note that these laboratories are intended to be downloaded instead of being run off the website.
Heavens Above
Heaven's Above contains maps, star charts and real-time data about satellites, ISS and space shuttle orbital passes.
Amazing Space Website
The Amazing Space website uses the Hubble Space Telescope to explore astronomy. There are numerous teaching ideas and activities located under the Educators tab. Of particular interest may be the Hubble Deep Field Academy that walks students through how to use real astronomical data to make discoveries about space. The Hubble gallery contains both pictures and videos of selected Hubble images.
The Hubble Space Telescope
The offical website for Hubble Space Telescope containing information about all aspects of the Hubble project. It has updates about the latest discoveries and images from the telescope (although the website has not been updated recently).
Melbourne University astrophysics website
The website for Melbourne Universities group for Astrophysics. Many sections of the webpage is still under construction, but there is information about current research and key people within the group.
Faulkes Telescope Project
The Faulkes Project is predominantly designed for free use by schools in the UK and Ireland, but other schools are allowed to apply for access. A small cost may be involved. This allows schools to apply for access to use the Faulkes telescope. Without membership you may access ideas and instructions for a range of activities and projects that make use of data from telescopes. The instructions should be clear enough to follow even if you have a limited background in astrophysics.
2 Degree Field
National Science Foundation
The National Science Foundation is an independant American government agency designed to promote science. This webpage contains numerous classroom materials for all areas of science. The easiest way to access these is by typing 'Classroom resources' into the search bar. It is also worth looking at 'Mosaic' the science magazine which has many articles that could be used as professional readings avaliable for free access.
Ned Wright's Cosmology Tutorial
Ned Wright's Cosmology tutorial is written with university students in mind, so does contain alot of high level discussions about cosomology, however there are some nice animations and applets that are very useful in the VCE setting.
Edwin Hubble
This page is dedicated to Edwin Hubble (who the Hubble Telescope is named after). There are some nice images here from the Hubble Telescope as well as the biolography of Edwin Hubble. Stargazer is an online application that allows students to view what the stars would like at any location, time or date.
Supernover Acceleration Probe (SNAP)
SNAP is a proposed probe to measure the expansion of the universe. There are lots of useful materials and online activites about the stars and the expansion of the universe in the educators' area.
Australian Astronomical Observatory
This is the homepage of the Australian Astronomical Observatory. Worth looking at are the virtual tours of the telescope, as well as numerous images.
The 2dF Galaxy Redshift Survey
This webpage contains many images taken from the 2DF redshift survey.
Cepheid Variables
Las Cumbres Observatory
Las Cumbres Observatories is a global network of telescopes. There is information here about the network and the work being carried out across the network. Under the education link are activites and how to articles. If you are new to teaching astronomy or astrophysics the how to articles are very useful. Spacebook is a guide to different terms used in astronomy/astrophysics. To find particular information about a topic (especially cepheid variables) it is best to use the search funtion found at the top on the homepage.
CSU Remote Telescope
CSU remote telescope run a program allowing schools the chance to use their education programs designed to teach students about the universe. Schools that use these programs are allocated a block of time to use the telescope for observations. There are some resources avaliable as well, such as fisheye and infra-red cameras, and links to other useful internet pages.
Hyperphysics - Inverse Square Law
Hyperphysics is a site setup to explain the concepts of physics. This page links to the inverse square forces. Clicking on the hyperphysics link will allow access to the homepage of hyperphysics.
The Electronic Universe
The Electronic Universe has information on many different fields of science. The space science link has access to numerous images, weblinks and education material.
Mechanism for Type 1A Supernova Explosions
This page explains the mechanism for supernova explosions. Using the homepage allows access to other lectures in the series.
Cephids and the Distance to the Large Magellanic Cloud
This webpage explains what cephids are and how they are used to find the distance to the large magellanic cloud (LMC). (Includes graphs and images.)
DS9: Astronomical Data Visualization Application
This webpage has an image and data visualization application for free download. There are versions for multiple platforms. It is best to read the guides before using and downloading.
Galaxy Formation
The STScI Digitized Sky Survey
This webpage allows images of the sky to be searched to find specific objects. As this page can be a little difficult to use at first it would be advisable to read the help page before trying to locate objects.
SIMBAD Astronomical Database
This is the webpage for the SIMBAD database, which provides data, cross-identification, and measurements for astronomical objects outside the solar system.
HubbleSite: Newscentre
The newscenter contains news articles from the Hubble telescope. There are other interesting articles and activities in the other sections of HubbleSite. Of particular interest may be the unfilter vodcast by a Hubble astrophysicist (found under Explore Astronomy).
Space.com - Space and Astronomy
Space.com contains news articles on the latest discoveries about the universe. There are a few articles about the formation of galaxies found by using the search function.
Our Sun
Origins Education Forum
Origins is an old website run by NASA. No new information is being added to the website, but there is useful information and activites still there. The focus of the site is the observation of the formation of galaxies, and the search for life. There are information about the missions and resources for teaching.
Big Bear Solar Observatory
The Big Bear Solar Observatory focuses on studying the sun. This webpage contains information about the projects carried out on this telescope. Images from these projects are avaliable to view on the site.
California Solar Centre
This webpage looks at how the sun is being used to harness solar energy.
Landline - Solar Systems
This landline article from 2002 looks at how solar energy is being used to provide energy to Indigenous communities.
Calculating the Solar Constant Activity
This activity walks students through how to calculate the solar constant. It also looks at common problems that scientists encounter in real life.
Heterogeneous Computing Environment
This page looks at the anaylsis of binary stars.
Visual Binaries
This page looks at visual binary systems. It includes clear diagrams and java applets.
The Sun: Lesson Plans
This page has lesson plans for various lesson plans. Each lesson plan has indication of the time required and the suggested year levels. These range from primary to highschool level.
Views of the Solar System
This page looks at information and data for each of the items within the solar system. This page also includes activities for use within the classroom.
SKA
Profile of the Parkes Telescope
This CSIRO page provides an overview of the famous Parkes Telescope (as seen in the Dish) with information about how it operates, the work it does and where to find it.
The Inflationary Universe
This website looks at how some of the problems found in the big bang theory can be in principal solved by a corresponding theory of the inflationary universe. Using the home menu provides access to a range of other pages with lots of information relevent to light and mater, astronomy, astrophysics and chemistry.
Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) from NASA
The WMAP is being used to create a detailed map of the anisotropy or differences in the temperature of the cosmic microwave background radiation. This website details the results of the probe from each round of data collection. The probe has been commissioned for 9 years of operations.
Australia and New Zealand SKA project
This website looks at the joint bid from Australia and New Zealand for the SKA telescope. The site has news updates about the bid; including photos and videos. There are also some teacher resources found under the Discover SKA tab.
The National Astronomy and Ionosphere Centre - Puerto Rico
This is the homepage for the National Astronomy and Ionosphere. It is claimed to be the world's largest radiotelescope located in Puerto Rico. The website is in English and contains information about current and past projects.
The Square Kilometre Array
The SKA project's website has updates on the latest development with the telescope. There are detailed descriptions of how the telescope will operate and projects that have been selected to run on the telescope. Of particular interest may be the media tab, which has printable posters, images, videos and a comic strip.
Supercomputing
Centre for Astronomy and Supercomputing
The outreach section of Swinburne University's Centre for Astronomy and Supercomputing has numerous interesting links. Of particular interest is Cosmos, an encyclopedia of astronomy. Also check regularly for updates on free lectures and podcasts to download.
Top 500 Supercomputing Sites
This webpage keeps a current list of the top 500 supercomputers (ranked on performance) in the world. The list is updated in June and November each year. Sublists can be created easily allowing sorting of these computers by most types of statistics; including country and region. There is also a blog updates fortnightly by Professor Whispers about what is new in the supercomputer scene.
Supercomputing at Swinburn.
This is the homepage for the Supercomputer at Swinburn University.
Virtual Milky Way
Light Pollution in Victoria
Some interesting photos showing the affect of light pollution on the night sky in Victoria. Unfortunatly the links to Dr. Barry Clark's papers are not currently working.
Counting the stars in the Milky Way
This activity introduces students to the statistical method of sampling. This method is used to count large numbers of objects such as the number of stars in the Milky Way or in a photo taken by the Hubble Telescope. The website also contains some other activities and a selection of songs for download.
The Discovery of the Milky Way
This website (part of a lecture series from the University of Arizona) details how the Milky Way was discovered. The picture of the rocket at the bottom of the webpage is a link to the rest of the lecture notes from the course. These are worth a look and contain useful pictures, applets and weblinks. At the end of each lecture is also a webtest.
Visit Mars
Retrograde motion of Mars
This is a simple applet demonstrates the retrograde motion of Mars.
Mars Classroom activites
This is a PDF of classroom activities which would be suitable for students across many year levels. Each activity is accompanied by a lesson plan which includes materials and suggested discussion questions.
The STScI Digitized Sky Survey
This webpage allows images of the sky to be searched to find specific objects. As this page can be a little difficult to use at first it would be advisable to read the help page before trying to locate objects.
Science News Magazine
This the website for the magazine Science News. It is subscription based and so there are many articles that can only be accessed by paid members. There are however alot of content also avaliable for free access. This free content is mostly more recent news, blogs, columns and features.
Australia Dreamtime
This website looks at some of the stories associated with Indigenous Asutralia's Dreamtime. There are some links at the bottom to Youtube videos of some of these stories. This site is part of a spiritual metaphysics site, and this viewpoint does influence some of the information found on the website.
Interviews
Profile of the Parkes Telescope
This CSIRO page provides an overview of the famous Parkes Telescope (as seen in the Dish) with information about how it operates, the work it does and where to find it.
Profile of the Anglo-Australian Telescope
This AAO website contains a profile of the Anglo-Australian Telescope, including facts and figures. Of particular interest to students may be the virtual reality tours (found under the AAO dropdown menu) and the numerous images taken by the telescope.
Profile of the Linux
The Linux website is currently unavalible due to maintenance, but should be back online soon.
Profiles of Women in Astronomy
This webpage has links to various female astronomers; including Henrietta Leavitt and Maria Mitchell. There are also links to other notable women in history if you are looking for some positive role models for female students.