Teaching

Organisational

• Where and when?
  Lectures: Tuesday (from Feb 25th to April 29th 2025, not on April 22nd), 10:30 - 12:00, room 320 by dr David Osten
  Exercises: Tuesday (from Feb 25th to April 29th 2025, not on April 22nd), 12:15 - 13:45, room 320 by mgr Achilleas Gitsis, dr David Osten
  Consultation hours: Tuesday 15-17, offices 442 or 444

Schedule from May will be irregular: 

• May 6th: double lecture

• May 13th: double tutorial

• May 20th: double lecture

• May 27th: written test 3 (black holes), tutorial

• June 3rd: lecture, tutorial

• June 10th: written test 4 (cosmology), tutorial

• Literature:
  - lecture notes
  - 'Introducing Einstein's Relativity' (R. d'Inverno),
  further reading: 'Gravitation', K. Thorne, Ch. Misner, J. Wheeler; 'Gravitation and Cosmology', S. Weinberg

• Grading:

  • Classes: four small written tests (two as homework, two in class)

    • Written Assignment 1, homework, to be handed in on 29th April (topic: Newtonian limit, Killing Vectors), Sample Solution

    • Written Assignment 2, homework, to be handed in on 13th May (topic: Gravitational waves, action principle), Sample Solution

    • Written Assignment 3, in class, 27th May 10:30-12 (topic: Black holes), Sample Solution

    • Written Assignment 4, in class, 10th June 10:30-12 (topic: Cosmology), Sample Solution

    • Formula Sheet available at written assignments in class and oral exam

  • Lecture: oral exam (June 24th)

  • 2x 10% bonus points if at least two oral presentations of exercises in class

Lecture Notes

1. BASICS (Newtonian gravity, Special Relativity, principle of equivalence) pdf

2. DIFFERENTIAL GEOMETRY (Differentiable manifolds, metrics, geodesics, curvature) pdf

3. GENERAL RELATIVITY (underlying principles, Einstein equations, gravitational waves) pdf

4. EXACT SOLUTIONS (modifications of Newtonian gravity, stars, black holes, cosmology) pdf

5. OUTLOOK (Quantum gravity, Kaluza-Klein theory, ...) pdf

MATHEMATICA notebook (by prof. A. Blaut): Einstein equations for static, spherically symmetric ansatz - Schwarzschild_TOV.nb

Problem Sets