Instructor: Steven R. Cranmer   (email, web page)
Instructor's Office:   Duane Physics D111 (main campus), LASP/SPSC N218 (east campus)
Course Times:     Fall 2020, Mon./Wed./Fri., 4:10-5:00 pm
Location: Duane Physics, Room E126
Office Hours: Zoom: Tuesdays, 11:00 to noon
Syllabus: See the most up-to-date PDF version.

Summary

This course is an introduction to radiative and dynamical (R&D) processes aimed at graduate students in astrophysics, space physics, and planetary science. R&D is intended to cover a handful of topics that are central to much of astrophysical and planetary sciences, but are rarely encountered at the undergraduate level. We will cover particle collisions and transport phenomena, magnetohydrodynamics, gravitational dynamics (applied to planetary orbits, stellar binaries, and N-body systems like galaxies), and a macroscopic treatment of radiation fields. This is a core required course for APS graduate students.

Course Venues

  • Most live/synchronous class meetings will take place in an always-open room on Zoom (see email for meeting invitation).
  • Video lectures will be posted to this course's YouTube channel.
  • We will use Canvas for you to submit homeworks, post questions for the weekly discussion sessions, and provide links to Zoom cloud recordings of class sessions.

Course Material

The primary "required readings" are my lecture notes, which will be posted below on this page as the semester progresses. Other resources for this course include:

Typical Weekly Schedule (revised)

  • Monday: discussion/recitation session (4:10-5:00pm)
  • Tuesday: Zoom office hours
  • Wednesday: watch video lectures; due-date for homework
  • Friday: watch video lectures
  • Late Sunday or early Monday: feedback due for next discussion

Lectures

Below we provide the material to be covered each week, links to electronic copies of any handouts and problem sets, and various course deadlines.

  1. Mon., August 24: Introductory lecture. Overview of course syllabus, and some review of necessary background math and physics.
    • Lecture notes (01) for course intro; background math and physics.
    • YouTube playlist for the day's lecture videos.
    • Homework 1 assigned, due Wed., September 9.
    • See Canvas for the link to the day's Zoom session recording.

  2. Wed., August 26: Transport phenomena: random walks & advection-diffusion equations.

  3. Fri., August 28: Recitation/discussion session.
    • See Canvas for the link to the day's Zoom session recording & slides.

  4. Mon., August 31: Transport phenomena: Brownian motion; Langevin equation; fluctuation-dissipation theorem.
    • YouTube playlist for the day's lecture videos.
    • Excerpts from the Pathria & Beale stat mech book about the Langevin equation.

  5. Wed., September 2: Transport phenomena: Intro to plasmas; Coulomb collisions, mean free paths.

  6. Fri., September 4: Recitation/discussion session.
    • See Canvas for the link to the day's Zoom session recording & slides.

      [Mon., September 7 is Labor Day, no classes.]

  7. Wed., September 9: Transport phenomena: Coulomb collision rates for large numbers of particles.
    • Homework 1 due.
    • Homework 2 assigned, due Wed., September 23.
    • YouTube playlist for the day's lecture videos.

  8. Fri., September 11: MHD: kinetic theory; Liouville's theorem and the Vlasov equation.

  9. Mon., September 14: MHD: kinetic theory; Boltzmann's collision term; Fokker-Planck equation.

  10. Wed., September 16: MHD: fluid moments of the Boltzmann equation for a plasma.

  11. Fri., September 18: Recitation/discussion session.
    • See Canvas for the link to the day's Zoom session recording & slides.

  12. Mon., September 21: MHD: basics of magnetohydrodynamics; magnetic pressure and tension.

  13. Wed., September 23: MHD: ideal and resistive magnetohydrodynamics; the induction equation.
    • Homework 2 due.
    • Homework 3 assigned, due Wed., October 7.
    • YouTube playlist for the day's lecture videos.

  14. Fri., September 25: Recitation/discussion session.
    • See Canvas for the link to the day's Zoom session recording & slides.

  15. Mon., September 28: Ideal MHD applications: potential and force-free fields.

  16. Wed., September 30: Ideal MHD applications: waves and instabilities.

  17. Mon., October 5: Recitation/discussion session.
    • See Canvas for the link to the day's Zoom session recording & slides.
    • Review sheet for Midterm Exam.

  18. Wed., October 7: Resistive MHD: Braginskii transport coefficients; fluid collision terms.

  19. Fri., October 9: Survey of plasma physics "beyond MHD."

  20. Mon., October 12: Recitation/discussion session.
    • See Canvas for the link to the day's Zoom session recording & slides.

  21. Wed., October 14: Dynamical processes: work, energy, and the Euler-Lagrange formalism.
    • Midterm Exam assigned (see Canvas). Due on Friday.
    • Lecture notes (08) for Lagrangian dynamics and 2-body Keplerian motion.
    • YouTube playlist for the day's lecture videos.

  22. Fri., October 16: Dynamical processes: two-body Keplerian motion derived from Lagrangians.

  23. Mon., October 19: Recitation/discussion session.
    • Homework 4 assigned, due Wed., November 4.

  24. Wed., October 21: Dynamical processes: astrophysical applications of two-body orbits.

  25. Fri., October 23: Dynamical processes: the restricted three-body problem; Roche lobes.

  26. Mon., October 26: Recitation/discussion session.
    • See Canvas for the link to the day's Zoom session recording & slides.

  27. Wed., October 28: Dynamical processes: three-body applications: resonances, tides.

  28. Fri., October 30: Dynamical processes: N-body systems: collisions and conservative forces.

  29. Mon., November 2: Recitation/discussion session.
    • See Canvas for the link to the day's Zoom session recording & slides.

  30. Wed., November 4: Dynamical processes: collisionless orbits in large-scale potentials.
    • Homework 4 due.
    • Homework 5 assigned, due Wed., November 18.
    • YouTube playlist for the day's lecture videos.

  31. Fri., November 6: Dynamical processes: Boltzmann stellar dynamics; tensor & scalar virial theorem.

  32. Mon., November 9: Recitation/discussion session.
    • See Canvas for the link to the day's Zoom session recording & slides.

  33. Wed., November 11: Radiation processes: specific intensity & moments of the radiation field.

  34. Fri., November 13: Radiation processes: equation of radiative transfer & its solutions.

  35. Mon., November 16: Recitation/discussion session.
    • See Canvas for the link to the day's Zoom session recording & slides.

  36. Wed., November 18: Radiation processes: the stellar gray atmosphere problem.

  37. Fri., November 20: Radiation processes: properties of stellar atmospheres.

  38. Mon., November 23: Radiation processes: beyond the gray atmosphere: non-LTE, non-gray, non-Eddington effects.
    • Lecture notes (12) for radiation processes: non-gray, non-LTE, spectral lines, ionization balance, irradiated atmospheres.
    • YouTube playlist for the day's lecture videos.

  39. Wed., November 25: Radiation processes: spectral line formation.

      [November 26-29: Fall Break, no classes.]

  40. Mon., November 30: Radiation processes: spectral line broadening.

  41. Wed., December 2: Radiation processes: ionization & recombination processes; H II regions.

  42. Fri., December 4: TBD day set aside for viewing & discussion of student presentations.
    • See Canvas for the link to the day's Zoom session recording & slides.

  43. Mon., December 7: Radiation processes: irradiated atmospheres; radiation pressure effects. Last day of class.

      [Tues., Dec. 8: Reading Day, Final Exam Week: Dec. 9-13.]

  44. Wed., December 9: Final Exam assigned (due on Friday, December 11).