TUM NAT FoPra85

Introduction:

This advanced lab course introduces you to observational astronomy. It involves observing star clusters with a telescope (weather permitting), analyzing the data, and deriving properties of the star clusters including their relative ages.

There are two types of star cluster in the Galaxy. Open clusters are loose collections of typically a few hundred stars in the galactic disk. These clusters tend to be young with ages of several million to a billion years. Typical cluster masses range between 100 - 1000 solar masses and their diameters are 1 - 10 parsec (where 1 parsec is ~3.3 light years). In our Galaxy more than 1100 open clusters are known. The estimated total number of Galactic open clusters is ∼ 2 x 10^4.

Globular clusters, on the other hand, are tightly bound collections of a few hundred thousand to a few million stars, typically located in the Galactic halo. These clusters are generally old with ages of a few billion years. The diameter of a typical globular cluster is about 40 parsec.

In this project, you will construct colour-magnitude diagrams of two open clusters. Using these colour-magnitude diagrams you will investigate the differences in morphology in these clusters and explain them in terms of their relative ages.

Course format:

The tasks in this course include learning the astrophysical background, taking data, and analysing them.

After you register for the course, you will be contacted by your tutor via email.

You will have two meetings with your tutor and a practical observing session.

First meeting: You will meet with the tutor to ask questions after reading the manual. You will also test the analysis pipeline for the data.
Second meeting: After handing in your report, you will meet with the tutors, who will provide feedback and corrections, and ask questions about your final project. Finally, the tutor will grade your work.
Observing: At some point after the first meeting, you will go to the telescope to get experience with practical astronomical observations.