Peter A. Becker, ST1 room 111, telephone 993-3619
Text: ``Radiative Processes in Astrophysics'' by Rybicki & Lightman.
The course will be organized around seven research areas that will help to demonstrate applications of fundamental physical principles to the modeling of specific astrophysical systems and processes. We will spend roughly two weeks on each of the following topics:
Photon-photon pair production in compact gamma-ray
sources; uniform-brightness models; angular dependence of gamma-ray
escape probability; detailed models.
Shock waves in astrophysics; classical fluid dynamics;
gas-dominated shocks; radiation-dominated shocks; simple models for
radiation transport.
Accretion onto black holes and neutron stars;
energy; angular momentum; critical conditions; transonic flows;
standing shocks.
Relativistic beams and apparent superluminal
motions in blazars; production of inverse-Compton gamma-rays;
angular and energy dependence of high-energy emission.
Acceleration of relativistic particles; first-
and second-order Fermi mechanisms; particle distribution functions;
Fokker-Planck equations.
Thermal Comptonization in astrophysical plasmas;
X-ray and gamma-ray emission; steady-state models; self-consistent
cooling.
Proton-proton collisions; photon-proton pair
production; creation of pions, muons, electrons, positrons, and
gamma-rays.
Grades will be based on homework, class participation, one exam, and one project.
