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[4097] Physics 316: Extragalactic Astronomy and Cosmology
General Resources
Below are some of the resources that may be of use
for general background reading around this course, and
of use for your
Assignment.
Index:
"Pop" Books &
Mags/Sites,
Outreach Sites,
Library,
Science Literature,
Search Engines,
Textbooks
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Search Engines on the WWW
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The various WWW/Browser Search-engines is an obvious way of
finding links to the wealth of information out there.
A few word of caution: these links are of course "unvetted".
Keep this in mind. Specifically
- the information may not always be up-to-date
- thus you may get two pages giving apparently conflicting results.
- (rarely) the information could be totally incorrect
- A good (but not perfect) indicator is whether the URL looks like
the page is
- part of a university course, a "project" site,
written by a scientist working in the field, or some
other reputable site
or whether the page
- appears to "just" be somebody's personal opinion.
Learning to vet pages on the internet is a skill we all need.
After trying to investigate on your own, if you are still
totally unable to decide whether material you find is
current or "valid"
e-mail ian.george@umbc.edu
(with the URL)
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Original Scientific Literature via the WWW
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The Main Astrophysics Journals are (alphabetically)
however, of course there are
many, many more
(including
Physics journals)
where articles associated with cosmology are published.
Articles from some of the (older) issues of these journals are
often available on-line free-of-charge.
However
the best way to search for:
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the work of a specific author
and/or using keywords in the title and/or abstract
is using
and for the most recent "preprints"
(& for older contributions too)
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information concerning the details of a specific
astronomical object
is using
Both of these also provide links to all the scientific literature
published to-date for that particular object.
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Many Cosmology "textbooks" have been published over the years.
These vary in their level of detail, quality, and of course
how up-to-date thhey are.
Here are a few that appear to provide a good background for at least
some of the aspects covered in this course.
Principles of Physical Cosmology
P.J.E. Peebles
(incomplete)
ISBN incomplete
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The Early Universe
E.W. Kolb & M.S. Turner
(incomplete)
ISBN incomplete
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Don't forget the
Albin O. Kuhn Library !
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Professional/Outreach Sites
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Here are some sites I'm come across that provide
some great "outreach"-style explanation & links
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"Popular" Astronomy WWW Sites/Magazines
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Here are sites to some "popular" science/astronomy magazines etc
which sometimes/often feature Cosmology.
Some of the (older) issues of the subscription magazines
are available free-of-charge.
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"Popular" Cosmology Books
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There are obviously many popular books discussing
various aspects of cosmology.
Here are few of the more recent that
seem to provide (at least some)
reading "around the subject"
at more than a very superficial level
(in random order):
Quintessence
Lawrence Krauss
(Basic Books)
ISBN 0-465-03741-0
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The Big Bang Theory
Karen C. Fox
(John Wiley & Sons)
ISBN 0-471-39452-1
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The Inflationary Universe
Alan H. Guth
(Perseus Books)
ISBN 0-201-32840-2
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The Matter Myth
Paul Davis & John Gribbin
(Simon & Schuster)
ISBN 0-671-72841-5
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