Welcome to the Stars and Stellar Evolution Computing Laboratory Course
This course is a critical component of the Stars and Stellar Evolution course (astro811). You will have the opportunity to simulate your own stars on the laboratory PCs using the state of the art stellar evolution package Window To The Stars.
I am no longer teaching at Uni-Bonn. The following information remains purely for the curious.
Course Information
The stellar computing labs will start 7th November 2014 and continue on Fridays at 8.45am until the final session on 23rd January.
You are required to write up the answers to the course questions as a formal written report in which you include evidence that you have done the work. This is not optional. Please, to avoid excessive workload at the end of the semester, write this up as you go along. If you are smart, you'll use LaTeX, if you're even smarter you'll use LyX or some similar software.
The report is your work, so even if you work with other people in class, you must write up your work, in your own words. However, you should follow the approximate structure, in particular the order, of the questions.
Marks will be removed for copied material.
I have been asked if the report should have, for example, an introduction. Think of it like this: if you were working in a company, e.g. as a consultant, your employer could ask you to write a report on any subject. Would you omit an introduction? No, you wouldn't. So treat this report like that and make it professional just like a real scientist would.
Deadline for the report is 9am on Monday 26th January 2015. This will be strict, please do not request extra time because you won't get it.
Please email me the report (izzard@...). The subject line of the email must be SSE LAB REPORT OF ... (insert your name).
Please do not submit a paper report - if you insist on using paper, scan it in the AIfA library and send me the PDF by email.
The instructor for the lab was very helpful in installing everything, even late at night.
We laways had a nice morning, even though it was so early.
I wish the lab wasn't so early (editor's note: so do we!)
The supernova simulation was the most epic experiment - period!
All in all we gained deeper insight into stars. Furthermore, we realized that WTTS is a really mighty instrument which is able to plot more then we ever thought. And most importantly, we had much fun.
The course was a lot of fun although it was very hard to get up so early every Friday :D (Ed: For me too!) We learned to interprate diagrammes which is very useful for any type of scientist, and are now able to use the programme Window to the Stars in a useful way.
This whole labcourse helped me very much with understanding the principles of stellar evolution. I, myself, am a visual person, learning by seeing. Therefore the diagrammes and plots produced in this class helped me very much to understand the internals and relativeness of various quantities in stars. I often wonder what would change in value X when I change value Y ? ... Window to the Stars gave me the possibility to actually test that!
While stars evolved and were analysed we always had a nice coffee talk about England and whiskey (sic).
