代写PHYS 1160 for Life Elsewhere Assessment
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代写PHYS 1160 for Life Elsewhere Assessment
PHYS 1160
for Life Elsewhere
Assessment
• Activities (32%) — The 21 course activities (interactive tutorials) are graded and
provide 32% of your final grade.
• Discussion Group Participation (26%) — 16% from contributions to the four module
discussions (Module 1, Module 2, Module 3/4, Module 5/6) and 10% from the Best
Discussion Contributions submission due at the end of the course.
• Essay (18%) — You must write an essay chosen from a range of suggested topics –
due 2th Oct, end of mid semester break.
• Final Test (24%) — The final test will be an online test set on the course website in
Moodle covering material throughout the course. (due 30th Oct — end of week 13).
4
About the Course
One of the first things you will notice about this course is that there are no lectures. Instead
course material is provided in the form of online Lessons. These are made of a mix of
multimedia material including text and images, videos, animations and simulations. You
can step through them page by page, you can display a whole lesson as a single
webpage, and you can print them to provide a hardcopy record of the whole course.
Associated with each lesson is an interactive tutorial, called an Activity, which will take you
step-by-step through aspects of the course content. Activities include videos and
simulations, and will set you problems based on these. Most questions in the Activities are
graded. Don’t think of the Activities as simply tests of what you covered in the lesson.
They may well extend the material covered in the lessons, and require further research in
the textbook, or on the internet.
Another key part of the course is the discussion forums. Your contributions to the
discussion will be graded. In each of the four discussions (Module 1, Module 2, Module
3/4, Module 5/6) you are expected to post at least one question, and one answer to
another students question. We are looking in particular for well-researched answers
supported by references. The skills used here will also be valuable when you come to
write your essay, which will be due at the end of week 9 of the course.
An important thing to understand about this course is that it is not about memorizing a lot
of facts that you will be subsequently tested on. There is far more material covered in the
course than you can expect to remember. What we do hope you will do is develop an
understanding of the basic concepts and ideas.
Remember that all assignments in this course including the final test are “open book”.
When you are working on the assignments you have access to all the resources including
the course lessons, the textbook, and the internet. You need to learn how to use these
resources efficiently to find whatever information you need.
Learning Outcomes
On completion of the course you should:
1. have an understanding of key recent developments and concepts in areas such as
astronomy, space exploration, astrobiology and related disciplines,
2. appreciate the interrelatedness of different scientific disciplines,
3. understand scientific method, what it means to study something scientifically and the
process of scientific discovery,
4. know that science is a continuing worldwide endeavour, and that scientists are diverse
in age, gender, ethnic background and nationality,
5. be competent in using resources on the internet to investigate scientific questions, and
in preparing written reports on such investigations.
5
Keeping In Touch
General questions about how the
course operates are best asked
through the course discussion forum
near the top of the Moodle main
page. That way everyone gets to see
the answers. Before you ask check
the course information, course FAQs
and course discussion. The answer
may well be there already.
If you want to contact a specific
member of the team you can do this
through Moodle messaging or
through email.
Who to contact:
For most queries your course instructor, Lucyna (lkedzior@unsw.edu.au), will be your first
point of contact.
Contact your group teaching assistant for feedback on marks and marking for the tutor marked
assignments (discussions, essays). If you are not sure who your teaching assistant is, use
“Participants” on Moodle and select “Teaching Assistant” in the “Current Role” drop-down
menu. You can click on the name to send a Moodle message, or choose “User Details” under
“User list” to find the email address.
For administrative matters such as enrollment issues you can contact Ranji Balalla
(r.balalla@unsw.edu.au) in the Physics First Year Office (Old Main Building LG03) phone 9385
4976.
Extensions for Assignments:
If you are unable to complete an assignment on time due to illness or other circumstances
please let us know in good time. We can usually make arrangements to handle such
situations. If you submit a formal “Special Consideration” request it will speed things up if you
email Lucyna or Jeremy at the same time. Note that such requests should be submitted no
later than 3 days after the assignment deadline.
Grades
http://www.pearson.com.au/products/A-C-Bennett-
Jeffrey-Et-Al/Cosmic-Perspective-The-Pearson-
New-International
3. The UNSW library has multiple copies in the High
Use Collection
If you are looking at second hand books or other online suppliers you may find other versions
of the The Cosmic Perspective 7th edition. Any of these are fine. They all contain the same
content but may have minor differences of formatting so page numbers may not exactly match.
International Edition US Edition
Older editions of the book such as the sixth or fifth edition will obviously not be quite as up to
date as the current version, but still retain the same chapter structure and much of the same
material so should be useable for this course.
You may come across The Essential Cosmic Perspective. This is a different book –
basically an abridged version with fewer chapters. The Cosmic Perspective sometimes comes
bundled with software products such as Pearson’s Mastering Astronomy. This software is not
used for our course.
Another book you may find useful is Life in the Universe by Bennett & Shostak, (Pearson
Higher Ed. ISBN 9780134089089). This provides better coverage of the Astrobiology aspects
of the course.
8
Lessons and Activities
Important elements of the course are the
series of lessons and activities. These
come in pairs, each lesson has a
corresponding activity. We recommend
that you first have a look through the
lesson and then try the corresponding
activity.
You may find it useful to have the lesson
and activity up on your screen at the same
time. If you are not sure how to do this
see the video - Working with Lessons and
Activities.
The activities are graded and provide the
largest single component of your course
grading. As you work through them you
will find that some questions have grades
and some do not. However, in most cases you will have to correctly answer a question
before you can move on to the next screen. You will need to complete an activity before its
grades will be entered on your gradebook. The activities are not timed and you can stop
and resume working on them at any time.
Note that these activities do not have individual completion deadlines. Other course
assignments such as the discussions and essays do have deadlines. It is up to you to plan
your time for the course appropriately. While you can do the activities at any time, we
recommend that you try to complete the activities for each module by the end of the two
week period assigned to that module, and do not leave them all until the end of
semester. All activities need to be completed by the end of week 13.
Module 1 — Introduction
Lesson 1 — Introduction to Astronomy
The components of the universe (stars, planets and galaxies), the scale of
the universe, a brief historical guide to the study of astronomy.
Lesson 2 — Introduction to Astrobiology
Why life might be common, or might be rare. The science of astrobiology.
Where and how can we search for life in the universe?
Lesson 3 — Key Concepts
Forces and Energy, Gravity, Orbits and Kepler’s laws. Atoms and nuclei.
Light and other electromagnetic waves.
Lesson 4 — Techniques of Astronomy
Telescopes and instruments for different wavelength regions. Observing
methods. Spectra and the Doppler shift.
Effect of the atmosphere. Observations from space.
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Module 2 — The Solar System
Lesson 5 — The Solar System
Introduction to the solar system. Terrestrial and giant planets, satellites,
dwarf planets., small solar system bodies. The formation of the solar system.
Lesson 6 — The Earth – Evolution of a habitable planet
Formation of the Earth and Moon. Age of the Earth. The heavy
bombardment. Plate tectonics. Formation of oceans and continents.
Evolution of the atmosphere. The faint-young Sun paradox and its resolution.
Lesson 7 — Exploring the Solar System
Getting to a planet. Types of space missions. The key planetary exploration
mission and what we have learnt from them. Ground-based studies of the
planets.
Lesson 8 — Habitability in the Solar System
Definition of a habitable planet. Follow the Water. Past water on Venus.
Evidence for water on Mars in the past and now. Evidence for oceans
beneath the ice of Jupiter’s moons and Enceladus.
Module 3 — Life on Earth and in the Solar System
Lesson 9 — What is Life?
Properties of life. Classification of living organisms, Evolution and heredity.
The molecular basis for life, DNA, RNA and proteins.
Lesson 10 — The History of Life on Earth
Methods for studying life’s history. The fossil record. The earliest evidence
for life. Molecular methods and the “tree of life”. Extremophiles. Life and the
Earth’s atmosphere.
Lesson 11 — The Origin of Life
Historical ideas on life’s origin. The fundamental problem. The RNA World.
Possible pre-RNA worlds. Origin of the building blocks of life. The timing of
life’s origin relative to the late heavy bombardment. Could life have come
from another planet?
Lesson 12 — Life in the Solar System
Ideas on life on Mars. Percival Lowell’s canals. Early Mars missions. The
Viking missions. The Martian meteorite ALH84001. Methane on Mars, Future
Mars missions. Life on the giant planet moons and how we could search for
it.
Module 4 — Stars
Lesson 13 — Our Star, the Sun
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The Sun’s energy source. Nuclear fusion. Structure of the Sun. Solar activity.
The Sun-Earth connection.
Lesson 14 — Properties and Evolution of Stars
Properties of stars. Spectroscopic classification. The Hertzprung-Russell
diagram. Types of stars. Evolution of low and high mass stars. Multiple stars.
Star clusters.
Lesson 15 — Stellar Birth and Death
The interstellar medium. Molecular clouds. Star formation. Planetary
nebulae. White Dwarfs. Supernovae. Neutron stars and black holes.
Module 5 — Other Worlds
Lesson 16 — Extrasolar Planets
Detection of exoplanets. Doppler, transit, microlensing methods. Types of
and properties of exoplanets (e.g. hot Jupiters, eccentric planets).
Comparison with our solar system.
Lesson 17 — Habitability and life on exoplanets
The problem of directly detecting exoplanets. Direct detection methods (giant
ground-based telescope. nulling inerferometers, coronographs, Occulters).
Signatures of habitability. Biosignatures.
Lesson 18 — The Search for Extraterrestrial Inteliigence (SETI)
Brief history of SETI. The Drake Equation. Radio SETI techniques. SETI at
optical and other wavelengths. Messages to the Stars. The Fermi Paradox.
Module 6 — Galaxies and Cosmology
Lesson 19 — Our Milky Way Galaxy
Size and structure of the Milky Way. The disk, bulge and halo. Orbits of
stars. Gas in the galaxy and recycling of gas. The galactic centre.
Lesson 20 — Galaxies and their Evolution
Types of galaxies. Distances of galaxies. Looking back in time. The Hubble
deep field. Galaxy formation and evolution. Active galaxies and quasars.
Lesson 21 — Cosmology
The expanding universe and Hubble’s law. The Big Bang theory. The cosmic
microwave background. Dark matter and the evidence for it. The accelerating
universe and dark energy, The standard model of the universe.
11
PHYS1160 Discussion Groups
Each group has been assigned a teaching assistant, who will moderate discussion and will
mark your assignments. Your teaching assistants are:
Group Teaching Assistant
Group 1 Karina Hudson
Group 2 John Bentley
Group 3 Micheal Wilczynska
Group 4 Claire-Elise Green
Group 5 Shaila Akhter
Group 6 James Esdaile
Group 7 Elizabeth Marcellina
Group 8 Stefan Contractor
Group 9 John Lopez
Group 10 Yevgeny Stadnik
Group 11 Shane Hengst
Group 12 Jiting Hu
Group 13 Elliot Griffiths
Group 14 Michael Wilczynska
Group 15 Elida Lailiya Istiqomah
Group 16 Trevor Leaman
Group 17 Behrooz Karamiqucham
Group 18 Deedee Yi Xin Lee
Group 19 Karima Ammar
Group 20 Egon Balnozan
Group 21 Graeme Melville
Group 22 Jinglin Zhao
Online discussion groups are an important part of this course. They are the second largest
component in grading counting for 26% of your overall grade. Discussion groups provide a
means to discuss and better understand the course material covered in the lessons and
activities.
The course is divided into six topical modules. There will be four discussions, separate
discussion for Modules 1 and 2, and then combined discussions for Modules 3/4 and
Modules 5/6. These discussions can be found under each Module section in Moodle. For
the purposes of discussion groups, students will be divided randomly into groups.
Using Discussions
Online discussions allow you to enter messages (known as posts) that can be seen by
everyone else on the group. Messages are linked in threads. When you add a message to
the discussion, you can use the Add a new discussion topic button to start a new thread.
Alternatively you can use the Reply button to an existing message to add another
message to that thread. When you add a message you can simply type your message into
the text box, or you can cut and paste from another program such as a word processor
(this is a good idea if you want to add a long message). You can include pictures in your
messages.
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The main purpose of PHYS1160 Modules discussion forum is the interaction between
students on the subject areas covered the specific Modules as described below. There is
also a “Course Discussion Forum” in the Introduction part to the course that can be used
to ask general questions about the course (e.g. details of course operations, assignments
etc.). This general discussion area should not be confused with the Module
discussions, where you will submit entries that are graded!
Course Requirements
Discussion group participation provides part of your course grade. As a minimum
requirement we expect you to contribute at least one question, and at least one
researched answer or follow-up comment to another student’s question, to each of the four
discussions (Module 1, Module 2, Module 3/4, Module 5/6). You are welcome to make
additional contributions to maximise your marks, which will reflect the quality of your posts
and your participation in the discussion.
Guidelines for Discussion Group Use
In the first discussion group please post a brief introduction about yourself. There will be
an introduction thread, and you should post your introductions as a reply to this thread (to
avoid cluttering up the discussion with many threads). These are not graded and do not
count as your required entries!
The questions you post on the module discussion group can be anything related to the
subject matter for the module (and since we have a course that covers a very wide range
this is not much of a restriction). Questions might relate to terms or concepts that came up
in the lessons that you don’t understand, might request further explanation of some aspect
of the subject matter, or might be just something (course related) that you have always
wanted to know, but hasn’t been covered in the course. Your teaching assistants and
course coordinator may also post questions in order to get discussion started.
Normally each question should start a new thread (use the Add a new discussion topic
button). When you enter a message there is a “Subject” field. Please try to put something
meaningful in here that describes what your question is about. This makes it easier for
everyone to navigate the discussion group.
The usual rules on attribution and plagiarism apply to discussion group posts as for
any assignment! If you use material from the web, journals or books, then reference the
source in your post.
Discussion Group participation is graded on quality (not quantity) of posts and
engagement in discussion (such as follow-up questions and responses). Remember that
posting just one answer and one question is a minimum requirement and is usually not
sufficient to achieve top mark for the discussion. So what is a good quality post? A post
that will score high marks is one that provides a clearly presented answer to a
question, shows evidence of good understanding of the issue and of some
research, includes in-text references to the sources used and generates more
discussion. A length of about one page should normally be about right – but use more if
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you feel the topic needs it. This is the sort of post you should be submitting for your Best
Contributions assignment later in the course.
Note that we have a wide range of students for this course with varying amounts of
background knowledge of the subject. If you are someone who knows all the answers,
please don’t immediately jump in and answer all the questions. Give other students a
chance. As pointed out already there are no marks for quantity of posts, so you would be
better giving a well researched response to one or two questions, rather than a short
answer to many.
If a question has already been answered this doesn’t mean that the topic is closed. You
may well be able to add more to the initial answer, to suggest a different approach to the
question, or you may think the original answer is wrong. The answer to a question may
well suggest follow-up questions.
The questions on the discussion group are for you, the students, to answer. However, your
teaching assistants will help if there are questions that have everyone stumped, and at the
end of each module, the teaching assistants will tidy up any unresolved threads.
Note:
- Early contributions to discussion are encouraged and attract 1 bonus mark for a post
within the first week of the new module discussion opening.
- Questions posted in the last 24 hours before deadline will not be marked, because they
usually do not contribute to the discussion.
14
PHYS1160 Essays
Essays should be between 1500
and 2000 words. The word limit
should include the text, figure
captions, footnotes, but not the
reference list (we are happy to see
lots of references). You will lose
marks for going more than 10%
over the 2000 word limit.
The format of the essay is not
specified. You are welcome to
include section headings and
pictures. However try to ensure
that they help to illustrate the
argument presented in the essay
and are not mere adornment.
Your essay should be written for a
well informed but non-specialist
audience. The style (not the
format) used in popular science magazines such as Scientific American or New Scientist
would be a suitable guide. Remember, you are not writing for experts, so if you use
technical jargon you will need to explain it. Refrain from using formulae, but instead
explain concepts in your own words.
Essays are expected to show evidence of researching the topic beyond the material
presented in the course lessons and textbook. The sources you use (websites, journal
articles, books) should be referenced. You should consistently use one of the standard
reference styles. One style is to number references sequentially in the text and include a
numbered list of references at the end of the essay. An alternative is to mark references in
the text using author and date e.g (Sagan, 1987) or Drake et al. (1965) and list references
at the end of the essay in alphabetical order.
If you use text from another source make it clear that it is a quote by placing it in quotation
marks and giving the reference to the source. However, you should not make excessive
use of quotes. The essay should be in your words and present your views on the subject,
not just an account of what other have said. Using text from other sources without
attribution is plagiarism and is not acceptable.
Your essay will use the TurnItIn system for submission that includes an automatic test
for plagiarism. Your submission will be checked against a large database of material and
tested for matches. The database includes all past essays submitted for this course. Make
sure that what you submit is your own work and that any material from other sources is
placed in quotation marks and the source cited. Copying material from the web (even if
you subsequently make edits to it) is considered to be plagiarism and it is unacceptable.
Read more on the plagiarism policy from http://student.unsw.edu.au/plagiarism .
TurnItIn is well designed to detect all plagiarism attempts!
TurnItIn gives a similarity score that indicates the percentage of the submission matched
to its database. While there may be legitimate reasons for matches (such as quotations
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and references) we tend to be suspicious if we see a high similarity scores.
Essays will be graded on:
o Degree of understanding of the topic (max. 6 marks)
o Quality and depth of research (max. 6 marks)
o Clarity of presentation (max. 6 marks)
o Original and outstanding coverage of the topic (max. 2 marks)
Submitting Essays
Essays are due before midnight on Sunday Oct 2nd (end of mid semester break). They
should be submitted online through the submission box provided in the Assessments page
on Moodle. You can submit it in a range of file formats (MS Word, WordPerfect, PDF,
Postscript, HTML, RTF and plain text).
Essay Topics — Choose one of the following
1. Space Telescopes
Explain why astronomers put telescopes in space. Describe in detail one space telescope
that does not observe visible light and list its achievements. Discuss major discoveries that
were possible with astronomical observations made from space and how they changed
our understanding of the Universe.
2. The Earliest Evidence for Life
Review the earliest evidence for life on Earth. What form does the evidence take and
where is it found. Discuss the controversies relating to some of this evidence and give
your conclusion on the earliest date at which we can be confident that life was present on
Earth.
3. Atmosphere Evolution on Rocky Planets
Compare evolution of atmosphere on Earth, Venus and Mars, and explain differences in
current atmospheric conditions on these planets. Describe how the Earth’s atmosphere
helped life to originate, survive and develop, and how has life affected the atmosphere
over time.
4. Life in Extreme Conditions
Explain what extremophile life forms are and where they are found on Earth. In view of
what we have learnt about extremophiles discuss the possibility of extraterrestrial life in
different places of our Solar system.
5. Key Space Missions
Choose ONE of the following space missions and give an account of the mission
describing the challenges it had to overcome and the mission’s achievements. Describe in
particular how it has influenced our understanding of the possibilities of past or present life
in the solar system.
o The Viking dual orbiter/lander mission to Mars.
o The Galileo orbiter/probe mission to the Jupiter system.
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o The Cassini/Huygens mission to the Saturn system.
o The Mars Exploration Rover mission (Spirit and Opportunity rovers).
6. Exploration of Venus
Describe the history of missions to Venus and their achievements. How did we learn about
the thick atmosphere and high surface temperature of Venus and how did we map its
surface? Should we consider Venus as a possible site for life in our Solar system?
7. Gravitational Waves
On Feb 11 2016 the announcement was made of the detection of gravitational waves from
space using the Advanced LIGO facility. What are gravitational waves? How does LIGO
detect them and why is this discovery significant?
8. Rosetta Mission
Explain why scientists study comets of the Solar system. Discuss the methods applied in
such studies. Describe the Rosetta mission and argue its importance in understanding the
history of our Solar system and development of life on Earth.
9. Inside stars代写PHYS 1160 for Life Elsewhere Assessment
Discuss internal composition of stars similar to our own Sun and compare it with
composition of white dwarfs and neutron stars. Explain how helioseismology and solar
neutrinos help to study interior of the Sun.
10. Space mission to Pluto
The “New Horizons” mission is exploring the outer Solar System. Describe the objectives
of the mission and important scientific instruments on the space probe. Discuss what we
have learnt about Pluto after the closest approach to this dwarf planet. Explain how this
mission helps us to understand the processes of formation and evolution of the planetary
system.
11. Formation of planetary systems
Discuss the early ideas about the formation of our Solar system. Compare our solar
system with other multi-planetary systems discovered in the last 20 years. Explain what we
have learnt about formation of planets from these discoveries. Describe the concept of
planetary migration.
12. Kepler and TESS
Compare the strategy and objectives of the NASA Kepler mission and the new planned
TESS mission. Choose one extra solar planet detected by the Kepler mission and discuss
its importance for our understanding of other solar systems.
13. Habitability of Planets
Explain what makes a planet habitable. In the context of currently known extra solar
planetary systems discuss the likelihood of habitable planets in our Galactic
neighbourhood. Describe some examples of recently discovered extra solar planets, which
are suggested to be habitable and explain why.
14. Role model astronomer/astrobiologist
Science advances by efforts of large collective of collaborating people, but there are
outstanding individuals that we all admire for their role in moving us forward in
17
understanding our world. Choose your favourite astronomer or astrobiologist that you
learnt about in studying this course, and describe their contribution to their field of
research. Explain why this person inspired you personally.
15. Dark Matter and Dark Energy
Explain both concepts and the differences between them. Describe the observations that
led to the hypothesis that dark matter is an important component of the Universe. Describe
the suggested constituents of the dark matter.
16. The Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence
Explain what is SETI and how it approaches the search for the ET. Explain why radio
telescopes are particularly useful in such a search. If we make contact with an advanced
extraterrestrial civilization discuss how likely it is that we will benefit from the encounter
through, for example, the information they may provide on advanced technologies, or are
we likely to suffer through the hostility of a species that competes for our resources and
perhaps our planet? Based on your assessment should we be advertising our presence by
sending messages to the stars or would we be better keeping quiet?
Factors you may wish to consider could include:
o Do we expect advanced intelligent species to be friendly or hostile to other species
(based on evolutionary theory, and the requirements of survival of such a
species)?
o Has the human race developed more or less tolerance of different peoples and
cultures as civilization has developed?
o The historical record of encounters between colonial and indigenous peoples on
Earth.
o Our record of treatment of closely related species such as the great apes.
o The vast distances between stars and the difficulty of physical contact with
extraterrestrial neighbours.
18
Best Discussion Contributions Submission
By the end of week 12 you should submit your choice of what you consider to be the two
best discussion group contributions you made during the course. These will normally be
answers or follow-up comments. They can be taken from any of the four Module
discussions (Module 1, Module 2, Module 3/4, Module 5/6). To do this combine the two
contributions together into a single file and submit this through the TurnItIn submission link
that you will find in the Module 6 section on Moodle (it works the same way as the
submission box for your essay). The submission is due Sunday Oct 23rd. These
contributions will be marked based on (1) the amount of research, (2) clarity of
presentation and (3) understanding of the topics, in contrast to four Discussion Modules
that are marked not only on quality of posts but also participation in the discussion. In your
submission to Best Discussion Contributions, you need to also include the questions,
which you answered.
19
PHYS1160 — Final Test
The Final Test provides 24% of your grade and will be an online test set on your course
Moodle website. It will be timed, with 90 minutes allowed for completion, and you have
only one attempt, so please make sure you are well prepared and have adequate time and
a stable internet connection before attempting it. The test will consist of multiple choice
questions (with single or multiple correct answers) that will be randomly selected so each
student will receive a different set of questions.
The Final Test will be available from Thursday Oct 20th and is due on Sunday Oct 30th.
A practice test will be also provided (by Thursday Oct 20th) that you can use to familiarise
yourself with the type of questions to expect in the final test.
代写PHYS 1160 for Life Elsewhere Assessment
