Overview

 

Sterrenkunde Practicum 2 consists of three main parts with the most important being the definition, execution and analysis of observations with the 2.5m Isaac Newton Telescope (INT) on La Palma, one of the Canary Islands. Each part is introduced in a lecture and carried out with the supervision of the assistants.

 

Python

During the course we will make extensive use of the programming language python. For this purpose there will be an introductory lecture on this topic on January 7, given by Erik Deul. You will also be given a follow-up problem set (optional, but recommended!) to get some practical experience with python before the course proper stars in February.

 

Write-ups

There will be two problem sets that you need to hand in written solutions to, similarly to what was done in Praktische Sterrenkunde).

 

Observing proposal

In preparation of the observing proposals we will discuss the proposed observing plans. The results of the observing run shall be presented in the form of a poster, this makes up the third part of the course.

 

Deadlines and hand-in

For the observing proposals, written solutions to the problem set, and the poster there will be strict deadlines. If, for some reason there is a possibility that a deadline will not be met, you need to let the lecturer know by email before the deadline including the reasons for the delay.

 

Goals

 

Sterrenkunde Practicum 2 has several goals who together aim to prepare you for future practical research, while the focus will be observational these are all valuable lessons for all astronomical research. The main goals are

• The preparation, execution and analysis of astronomical observations with a professional telescope.
• Practical error analysis.
• The fitting of models to data, such as the χ² fit.

 

Collaboration

Collaborative work is a crucial part of scientific research, and discussions with your fellow students is therefore a very good thing. It is therefore allowed to discuss problems with your fellow students, but for the problem sets each student must hand in her/his own written solutions and reports that are too similar to each other will be rejected. The observing on the INT will be done in groups and each group does only need to hand in one report or poster.

 

Computational aspects

In order to analyse the results from the observing program it is necessary to use various astronomical software packages, such as SExtractor and ds9. These packages are  available on the Linux cluster of the Sterrewacht (not the Windows machines). The students in the course will therefore get an account on this cluster. In the first lecture you will get an introduction to Linux and basic software usage. This introductory lecture is essential for the rest of the course.

 

Assistants

There are three assistants for the course - see above for their names and contacts. These are your first contacts for help.

 

Reports

The hand-in reports have to be sent to the lecturer by email by the date indicated in the Rooster. The report should be in an electronically readable format. I am happy with Microsoft Word or PDF (preferentially) formats - please convert any other format to PDF. A delivery in any other format will be returned to the sender. The reports should be readable on their own - it should not be necessary to read the problem description to read the report.

 

It also important that the reports make it clear how each result was achieved. To achieve this different people need different lengths of report so there is no strict limit on the length of the reports but generally speaking it is bad to be very verbose and very brief. Typically a good report will be shorter than 15 pages A4. The preferred language for the reports is English (this is good practice for your later work), but I will also allow reports in Dutch. Some further pointers on a good report is found here.

 

Grading

The reports will be first checked by the assistants for factual errors, the analysis of the problem, the clarity of the presentation and the completeness. Thereafter the lecturer will decide on a grade. The final grade of Sterrenkunde Practicum 2 will be the average of the grades of the three parts. You can have a maximum of one (1) grade of 5 in the first two problems - unless you have an average grade from the three parts is at least 6 (without rounding).