9. Galaxy Characteristics
9.1 Galaxy types
9.1.1 What are the three main types of galaxies?
9.1.2 What parts of a spiral galaxy are seen at different wavelengths?
9.1.3 How are the most distant galaxies different from nearby ones? Why?
9.2 What type of galaxy is the Milky Way?
9.2.1 What is the Milky Way like? – shape, major parts
9.2.2 What are the stellar populations, and what do they tell us about the Milky Way?
9.2.3 How did the Milky Way form? What is the evidence? What gives it its current appearance (e.g., disk, halo, spiral arms)?
9.3 The center of the Milky Way
9.3.1 Why is it important?
9.3.2 Why do we believe there is a supermassive black hole there?
9.3.3 What accounts for most of the energy from the Galactic Center?
9.4 Active Galactic Nuclei
9.4.1 What powers an active galaxy nucleus (AGN)?
9.4.2 What are the observed consequences from an AGN?
9.4.2.1 Strange emission line properties
9.4.2.2 X-ray, radio emission
9.4.2.3 Variability – and what it means
9.4.2.4 Jets, what they are
9.4.2.5 Faster-than-light motions – what causes them
9.4.3 What is a quasar? How were they discovered?
9.4.4 Why are AGNs important?
10. Dark matter, the interstellar medium, and star formation
10.1 Why do we think spiral galaxies contain a lot of dark matter?
10.1.1 Where is it within the galaxy?
10.1.2 What is the dark matter thought to be?
10.2 The interstellar medium
10.2.1 How it was discovered
10.2.2 Types of nebula
10.3 Star formation
10.3.1 Stages of collapse into a protostar
10.3.2 Evolution of a protostar onto the main sequence
10.3.2.1 For objects of stellar mass
10.3.2.2 Masses above or below the stellar range
10.4 Spiral arms in galaxies
10.4.1 What marks spiral arms to make them bright?
10.4.2 How do they form?
10.4.2.1 Density wave theory
10.4.2.2 Sequential star formation
10.5 Mergers and starbursts
10.5.1 Do galaxies collide? What happens to them when they do?
10.5.2 What is a starburst?
11. How the solar system formed
11.1 Planet formation
11.1.1 What stages to circumstellar disks go through?
11.1.2 When do gas giant planets form?
11.1.3 When do terrestrial planets form?
11.2 Evidence for planets around stars other than the sun
11.2.1 How can we detect planets by measuring stellar Doppler shifts?
11.2.2 What other means do we have to detect, or at least infer the existence, of planets around other stars?
11.3 Overview of the solar system
11.3.1 Terrestrial planets, list and chief characteristics
11.3.2 Giant planets, list and chief characteristics
11.3.3 What are the trends in planet properties within the solar system, as the distance from the sun increases? What produced them?
11.4 Exploring planets: besides telescopes, what means have we used to explore planets (and the moon)?
12. Properties of the planets
12.1 The moon
12.1.1 How it formed
12.1.2 Age of the moon and how it is determined
12.1.3 How the cratering rate has changed over time
12.2 Mercury
12.2.1 Evidence for great heat during formation
12.2.2 Range of surface temperatures, why it is so large
12.3 Venus
12.3.1 Comparison with Earth
12.3.2 Surface features, composition
12.3.3 Venus greenhouse, how it works, what it does
12.3.4 Greenhouse on Earth, how it works
12.3.5 What effect are humans having on the earth's greenhouse effect?
12.4 Mars
12.4.1 Canals - what are they?
12.4.2 Geology - plate tectonics, volcanos
12.4.3 Weather - atmosphere
12.4.4 Evidence for water
12.5 Jupiter
12.5.1 Size compared with other planets, nature of the interior and "surface"
12.5.2 Internal energy and its effect on weather
12.5.3 Jupiter's magnetic field and what it tells us about the inside of the planet
12.5.4 What the surface of Jupiter is like
12.6 Saturn, Uranus, Neptune
12.6.1 Similarities and differences in internal structure between Saturn and Jupiter
12.6.2 How the internal structures of Uranus and Neptune differ from Jupiter and Saturn, and why