Instructor Prof. Dave Goldberg (goldberg@drexel.edu)
Disque Hall Room 810
Lecture: T, Th, 9:30-11
Office Hours: (Note change) M,W 2-3

Useful Links

• Max Tegmark's CMB movies

• "Seven-Year Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) Observations: Power Spectra and WMAP-Derived Parameters" - D. Larson et al.

• 1/1/12: syllabus
• 1/12/12: HW #1 - Solution Key
• 1/27/12: HW #2 - Solution Key
• 2/2/12: HW #3 - Solution Key
• The Midterm Exam will be held on February 14 during class period. Here are some old exams:
  • 2008 Exam - Solution
  • 2010 Exam - Solution
• 2/3/12: Midterm Equation Sheet
• 2/9/12: HW #4 - Solution (and a bonus maple worksheet to help you understand the Saha equation).
• 2/14/12: Midterm Exam Solution Key
• 2/21/12: HW #5 - Solution
• 2/22/12: A nice, recent review article by Alan Guth on eternal inflation
• 2/23/12: Bob Gilmore's notes deriving the Saha Equation
• 2/28/12: Some additional lecture notes on Jeans Instability and the linear growth of structure.
• 3/1/12: HW #6 - Solution Key
  For this assignment, we have three possible data files:
  • delta_model1.txt
  • delta_model2.txt
  • delta_model3.txt
  Some basic instructions for taking the power spectrum:
  1. In whatevever language you choose, read the text file into a data grid (2-d array) of some sort.
  2. Take the Fourier Transform (doing and understanding this will probably be the hard part)
  3. To get the power spectrum of each point in k-space, compute d_k* conj(d_k)
  4. Average over k. That is, just like in real space, you can compute k=sqrt(kx^2+ky^2), where you can define k in terms of multiples of 2*pi/N. Average over bins.
  5. Only go up to kmax=N/2.
  6. Plot the power spectrum on a log-log plot.
• Here's a sample code that generates a 1-d function and computes the power spectrum. You may find it useful to get a running start.
• The Final Exam will be held on March 20 at 1:00pm in Stratton 101. Here are some old exams:
  • 2008 Exam - Solution
  • 2010 Exam - Solution
• 3/14/12: Final Exam Equation Sheet
• 3/16/12: hw6_power.py, my code for doing problem 1 on the homework, above. If you had difficulties, you may find this instructive.
• 3/21/12: Grades are posted. Here is the Final Exam Solution Key