Course Objectives

To explore some of the exciting new astronomical advances and discoveries which await us in the first few decades of the twenty-first century. The class consists of 10 meetings of two hours, during which we will discuss in detail a wide range of astronomical topics, from the Solar System to the Big Bang, from advanced instrumentation to extraterrestrial intelligence.
 

Course Topics

• Overwhelmingly Large Telescopes: the Future of Ground and Space-based Astronomical Observations
• Extra-Solar Planets and the Search for ETs: Is There Anybody Out there?....
• Einstein's Universe: a Beginners' Guide to Special and General Relativity
• Echoes of the Big Bang: Cosmology in the Third Millennium
• Solar Physics in the Third Millennium
• Deep Impacts: the Threat of Extinction Level Asteroid Collisions
• Ripples in Spacetime: the Search for Gravitational Waves

Course Lecturers (Provisional)

Course Presentations

Links to online copies of the some of the lecture presentations will appear here during the course

Some Interesting Websites

Click here to link to the homepage of Starry Night, the astronomical display program used occasionally in the course

Click here to link to the Astronomy Picture of the Day  website

Click here to link to the website of the World's Largest Optical Telescopes

Click here to link to the ESO Very Large Telescope homepage

Click here to link to the homepage of the Hubble Space Telescope

Click here to link to the homepage of Heavens Above (for info on the ISS, Mir and Iridium flashes visible in your area)

Please send any comments or questions on Astronomy in the Third Millennium to Martin Hendry