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 Colby College's astronomy program provides
opportunities for liberal arts students to learn astronomy using
state-of-the-art equipment. This program in conjunction with the
physics major also provides excellent training for students
interested in graduate programs in astronomy. The Department of
Physics and Astronomy offers two courses in astronomy. In addition,
all students can undertake independent research projects. For
students interested in graduate programs in astronomy, the physics
major together with independent research with Professor Murray
Campbell is ideal undergraduate preparation, since astronomy graduate
programs primarily build on the principles of undergraduate physics
courses. In fact, courses in astronomy are not necessary for
admission to graduate schools in astronomy. All Colby alumni/ae who
have gone on to graduate work in astronomy participated in research
at Colby. Astronomy students have often worked in summer REU
internship programs at universities and observatories. Students work
on a research projects at Colby in their senior year as part of the
requirements for a phyiscs major.
Colby's courses are AS151, Introduction to Stars
and Stellar Systems, and AS231 Introduction to Astrophysics. An
on-line Study Guide
for AS151 is available. Both courses have
labs. AS151 uses high-quality 8-inch Schmidt-Cassegrain telescopes,
while AS231 uses Colby's Collins Observatory which has a 14-inch
telescope equipped with a high quality CCD camera with photometric
color filters and a grating spectrometer. A high sensitivity liquid
Nigrogen cooled CCD camera was installed in early 2002.
This figure shows the central part of an
image of the famous Orion Nebula taken in a 60 second exposure with a
Photometrics Star 1 CCD camera through a red filter. It is a direct
image and shows bright stars and the densest knots of gas in the
Nebula. About one-third of the way up from the bottom of the frame is
the Orion Bar, an extensively studied ridge of dense gas ionized by
the bright stars in the region. The brightest stars are over-exposed,
and their images show electronic bleeding in the CCD camera. The new
CCD camera is twice as sentitive as the Photometrics Camera, and has
a larger dynamic range.
The figure on the right shows the same image computer
enhanced to bring out low density hot gas in the fainter outer edges.
These images were obtained by students in AS231. Students can
undertake research projects and senior theses using this
telescope.
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