PHYSICS 1081 ``Planetary Astronomy Lab''  Fall 2023

Credits: 1.00     CRN: 21965 Class Home page:   https://jpastro.net/AST1081/syll-phys1081.html  Instructor: Dr. Jason Pinkney Office hours  in 111 Science Annex at  these times: 9-10 on R, 10-11 on T, 1-2 on T, 3-4pm on W and R. Email j-pinkney@onu.edu or call my office: 419-772-2740. Instructor's Home page: https://jpastro.net/ Class time:  Tuesday 3:00-3:45 PM (brief meetings). Nighttime labs will be on Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday evening (depending on weather) 9:00-10:15 pm (beginning of term), ~7:30-8:45 pm (end of term). Class place:  Science Annex 108A (brief meetings); ONU Observatory (outdoor labs). Observatory Phone: 419-772-4028. Instructor's cell: 419-979-7678.

NEW STUFF       (Watch here for new, lab-related files.)
Indoor/Outdoor Lab: Observing the Planets PDF. (In case you need to print out replacement pages.)

Online Lab: Mountains on the Moon Lab This 5-page PDF is a nice activity about measuring the height of a lunar mountain. It requires no data, but it can replace the outdoor lab "Lunar Surface Features". You would make a hardcopy, fill it in, and turn it in.

Online Lab: Comet Motion Lab This lab requires two images of a comet taken at known times. One of them gives the "plate scale" in arcseconds per pixel. The other may be at a different scale. Your job is to analyze the images and figure out the comet's speed in units like degrees/day.

Comet C/2023 H2 (Lemmon), Pic 1 On Nov 13 the Planetary Lab took this 90 sec exposure with Canon T5i on the Celestron C11. This comet had a very high angular speed of about 21 arcsec/minute, or 8.5 degrees/day! The green color of the coma, caused by C₂ emission, is common in comets.
Comet C/2023 H2 (Lemmon), Pic 2 Our final, 547 sec exposure of the comet. The trail is crooked because the exposure was unguided and the tracking is imperfect. North is up and East is left, approximately, so the comet was headed to the southwest.

Course Description:
Astronomy labs requiring math at the algebra level. These labs will reinforce the material presented in class (PHYS 1051), including: the celestial sphere, coordinate systems, motions of the planets, planetary surface features, lunar surface features, moons of planets, and small bodies of the solar system.

PHYS 1081 is the lab associated with the course PHYS 1051, Planetary Astronomy. There is only 1 section, since mainly astronomy minors and physics majors with astronomy concentration need to take this lab. Other students can attend the lab with instructor's approval, especially students who need a science + lab elective, such as Computer Science majors.

Course Objectives:
Throughout this course, students will:

• Obtain knowledge of astronomy, especially concerning the planets, their satellites, comets, asteroids, and the appearance of solar system objects
• Develop scientific skills related to astronomy, such as visual observing with the naked eye and with telescopes
• Gain practice in astronomy related formulas like Kepler's laws and the relationship between angular size, actual size, and distance

Lab logistics: The class time is usually listed as "TBA" in Course Offerings, so our first job is to determine good times to meet. I will send out an email on the first week to check with you about suggested times. You must reply or you may have to drop the course if the chosen time doesn't fit with your schedule.

We will have an informational meeting on the second week in which we review the syllabus and you will be assigned your first lab. Labs consist of indoor labs (mostly computer-based) and outdoor labs.   The outdoor labs require a mostly clear sky and will be postponed in the case of bad weather. The indoor labs will primarily be from the Virtual Astronomy Labs software which is loaded on various computers in the Physics Dept and the Observatory. We will do the outdoor labs together at the Observatory, the exact time to be announced in the daytime session on Monday or Tuesday. The indoor labs are done independently at whichever time is convenient for the student. These can be done the Astronomy Lab (SA 108A), or in the Physics Lounge (SA 116).  

We will reserve 3 nights a week for the outdoor labs and choose whichever one has the clearest forecast. (We won't go out if cloudy weather is in the forecast.) Some weeks will have no suitable nights for observing. So on average, we will end up using less than 1 night per week. You can walk to the observatory, or arrange with me a ride from the Physics Department. Let me know your preference.

Course materials: No textbook required. Please have a notebook with neatly detachable paper for writing up indoor (VAL) labs and for taking notes. Clipboards and lights will be provided at the observatory. Two, 3-ring binders containing the instructions for the Virtual Astronomy Labs will be kept in SA 108A. It is also helpful to have an astronomy textbook, like the one used in PHYS 1051, for reviewing the principles being studied. Old editions can be found in SA 116.

Grading:
Your grade will be based primarily on the completion of indoor (computer-based) and outdoor labs. The table below shows 10% of the grade based on telescope certification and sky quiz. However, if weather conditions or other circumstances interfere with the telescope certification and sky quiz, the grade may be based 100% on the Labs. Your goal should be to complete all of the labs and do a thorough job on the labs. Most individual labs will be worth 10 points, the exception being the first lab "Observing the Planets" which is worth 30 points.

I will not grade any "harder" than the above. 

Course Policies

Attendance  is essential for labs.  One short period per week for the daytime meeting and one night a week is all that is expected.   Two extra nights are reserved to make up for cloudy nights, but some weeks will be completely clouded out. (This is one reason why the Outdoor labs are allotted 2 weeks on the schedule.)
Most of the lab work will be computer-based labs which are done outside of class time.

Access to rooms SA108A, SA116  is needed to work on the "indoor" (computer-based) labs. We will work with the STM coordinator and the Physical Plant to arrange for your ID cards to work in the swipe locks. Have patience since this sometimes takes awhile. In the meantime, you can ask faculty in the Physics program to unlock these doors for you during the hours of approximately 8 to 4:30 pm.

Telescope Certification and Final/Sky Quiz. You can earn a telescope certificate, meaning that you can operate our telescopes independently. The certification has two parts: a "Sky Quiz", and a telescope operation test. We usually do not have time to certify everyone to use the telescopes. Students who 1) wish to assist in public astronomy events or use the telescopes for research, 2) are Astronomy minors or Physics majors, and 3) are younger than seniors will be encouraged to get certified. Passing the "Sky Quiz" is necessary for certification on a telescope. The telescope operation test is done outside and one-on-one. You are required to start up a telescope with an equatorial mount (CGE Pro) and acquire targets in that telescope's field of view.
The "Sky Quiz" tests you on knowledge of the sky that is particularly relevant to telescope operation. Even if you are not certified, you may be given the "Sky Quiz". It will make up no more than 10 percent of your grade. The "Sky Quiz" will probably be given as an outdoor, oral exam. It might be adapted into a written final quiz, if the instructor sees fit. For the Sky Quiz, you should be able to identify at least 7 constellations, and the 5 brightest objects (stars or planets) visible.  You should be able to describe how the equatorial and altazimuth coordinate systems work, and you must find the north celestial pole, the zenith, the cardinal points, and the celestial equator. 

Calculators. I strongly encourage you to have a calculator in this lab.

Academic Misconduct In PHYS 1081 (this class), you are encouraged to discuss your assignments with classmates. However, you should not copy each other's work. There may be some outdoor labs where you will be using the same data, but do your own calculations and analysis. For indoor, "Virtual" labs, each of you should have different data provided randomly by the computer, so here it is expected that you have slightly different results. Both parties may be penalized points for having identical results for the VAL labs.

Schedule (tentative):

Week of	Indoor Lab	Outdoor lab   (if clear)
W1 (8/21-25)	We choose meeting times.	Choose meeting time.
W2	Syllabus. "Observing the planets"	Orientation/"Observing the planets"
W3 (9/4-8)	"Observing the planets"	"Observing the planets"
W4 (9/11-15)	"Observing the ...", VAL 6	"Observing the planets"
W5	VAL 6 ("Latitude, Axial Tilt, ...")	"Observing the planets"
W6	VAL 9/11 ("Orbital Motion of a Planet")	"Angles in the Sky"
W7	VAL 9/11 (Use Pinkney's program)	"Angles in the Sky"
W8 (Break,10/9-10)	VAL 7 (Lunar motion)	"Satellite Predictions"
W9	VAL 7 (Lunar motion)	"Satellite Predictions"
W10	VAL 10/12 "Kepler's Laws"	"Lunar Surface Features"
W11	VAL 10/12	"Lunar Surface Features"
W12 (11/6-10)	VAL 11/13 Planetary Ring systems	Imaging Comets/Asteroids
W13 (11/15-19)	VAL 11/13	Imaging Comets/Asteroids
W14 (11/27-12/1)	Sky quiz	Finishing remaining labs
W15	Sky quiz.