Cosmology, 10 hp, Fall 2016

 

Literature:

Barbara Ryden, "Introduction To Cosmology",  either the edition from 2002/2003 or 2013 (the content is identical)

 

Contents:

The world models of general relativity, cosmic expansion, thermodynamics and nucleosynthesis in the early Universe, dark matter and dark energy, methods for measuring cosmological parameters, structure formation, the cosmic microwave background radiation, inflation, black holes, parallel universes and alternative cosmologies.

 

Prerequisites:

Knowledge corresponding to a Bachelor's degree in physics, or similar.

 

Examination:

Seminars, literature report and hand-in exercises.

 

Teacher:

Erik Zackrisson, erik.zackrisson(at)physics.uu.se, phone: 018-471 5975

 

Time:

October 2016 - January 2017

 


If you are interested in participating but did not register the formal way, please notify Erik Zackrisson as soon as possible!

 

Schedule

Date

Time

Room

Lecture/
Exercise session/
Seminar

Topics

To read
(refers to 2002/2003 edition of textbook)

To turn in/prepare

Oct 25

13-15

Å80115

Lecture 1

Course information

Course overview

Cosmic epochs

Chapter 1

 

Oct 28

13-15

Å11167

Lecture 2

Cosmological principle

Cosmic expansion

General relativity

Metrics

Chapter 2 + first half of chapter 3

 

Nov 15

15-17

Å13167

Lecture 3

Robertson-Walker metric

Proper distance

Cosmic dynamics

Second half of chapter 3 + chapter 4

 

Nov 17

13-15

Å4005

Lecture 4

Dynamics with single and multiple components
Concordance cosmology
Fate of the Universe

Chapters 5 + 6

 

Nov 21

10-12

Å4005

Lecture 5

Measuring cosmological parameters

Dark energy

Chapter 7

                                                            

Nov 24

 

15-17

Å80109

Exercise session I

 

 

Nov 28

15-17

Å80109

Seminar I (group A)

Common misconceptions about modern cosmology

 

See instructions for seminar I

Nov 29

13-15

Å80115

Seminar I
(group B)

Common misconceptions about modern cosmology

 

See instructions for seminar I

Dec 2

13-15

Å80115

Lecture 6

Dark matter

Chapter 8

 

Dec 6

13-15

Å12167

Lecture 7

Cosmic microwave background radiation

Chapter 9

 

Dec 7

 

13-15

Å80115

Lecture 8

Big bang nucleosynthesis

The early Universe
Inflation

Chapter 10-11

 

Dec 13

13-15

Å11167

Exercise session II

 

 

 

Dec 16

13-16

Å6K1113

Seminar II

Parallel Universes

 

See instructions for seminar II

Dec 20

13-15

Å11167

Lecture 9

Structure formation

Chapter 12

 

Dec 21

13-15

Å11167

Seminar III (group A)

Strange Universe

 

See instructions for seminar III

Dec 22

15-17

Å11167

Seminar III (group B)

Strange Universe

 

See instructions for seminar III 

Jan 3

 

 

 

 

 

Written literature report

Jan 10

13-15

Å80109

Oral reports
(group A)

 

 

Oral literature report

Jan 11

10-12

Å80115

Oral reports
(group B)

 

 

Oral literature report

Jan

12

13-15

Å80109

Extra session

To be used only if something earlier in the course gets cancelled

 

 

Jan 13

 

 

 

 

 

Hand-in exercises

           

 

Examination

·     Three seminars

·     Six hand in-exercises

·     Written essay (minimum 3 pages) + oral presentation (10 minutes)

 

 

 Course material

·     Assessment criteria

·     Seminar instructions: I, II, III

·     Dataset for seminar III

·     Exercise sets with solutions: I, II

·     Hand-in exercises

·     Matlab code for numerical integration

·     Lecture notes: L1, L2, L3, L4, L5, L6, L7, L8, L9


Errata

·     Nov 23, 2016: A few minor glitches in the solutions to exercise set I were corrected on Nov 23, 2016

·     Dec 1, 2016: The integral describing the luminosity distance for the concordance cosmology is only valid for a flat Universe. Clarifications about this have been added to slides 14 and 19 of lecture 5, to solution 4 in exercise batch 1 and to the matlab scripts

·     Dec 1, 2016: Very slight modifications to the text in hand-in exercises 2 and 5 (no need to download again in case you already started with these)