AST205

News resources and browsing instructions

Below is a sample of internet resources for astronomy/physics related news. If you have suggestions of other links, please post them on your group journal and I will add them to this page.

• Nature (should be visible from on-campus computers)
• Science Daily
• Science Mag
• Space weather (fun site, fresh discoveries, space weather report!)
• Astronomy Now
• Bad Astronomy (very interesting blogs)
• Centauri Dreams (blog)
• Oklo
• NY Times Science
• NY Times Science, Astronomy and Astrophysics
• Astro-ph or ArXiV (the ultimate resource; most fresh astronomy papers are uploaded to this preprint server. Very advanced, but the titles and abstracts are worth reading. Quite often this is the resource for the media!)
• Astronomy picture of the day
• Selected postings from arxiv for undergraduates. Compiled by graduate students.
• Excellent collection of space photos.
• Earth-sky portal

Instructions for news browsing

Please browse the relatively recent news and if you find something interesting and relevant to our course, then post the news and your comments at your group journal. Please note, NOT the group blog, wiki, discussion board, etc, but the group journal. (You can use these other resources for collaboration with your group members, but we will not routinely check those, will not comment on those, and will not take them into account at grading).

Once you find interesting news, try to do a little research, e.g. look up other on-line portals with the same news (are they reporting the same, or perhaps they are different?), try to find the related press release, locate the underlying scientific publication(s). Look at user forums for comments and debates. Do research on topics that are in the news but you are unfamiliar with. Collaborate with your group members in discussion of the news.

Once during the semester your group will suggest the news that I cover in the beginning of the lecture. I will let you know when it is your turn.

Please remember, 5% of your grade will depend on your news browsing activity, as demonstrated on the group journal. Finally, news that I cover in the lectures will be part of the exams and possibly the homeworks.

Some guidelines for the relevant rubric are as follows:

0 %
Barely familiar with news resources, no activity shown in browsing and recommending news.

25 %
Familiar with basic popular news resources, some activity in browsing, analysing and recommending news during the course.

50 %
Familiar with news resources, including the science columns of selected newspapers and some science news. Show some activity in browsing throughout the year, analysing and recommending news during the course, commenting on these news.

75 %
Like 50%, but has gone as far as tracking down the science news and original publications for selected news items.

100 %
Weekly activity in discussing course related news, familiarity with all such resources, including the location of the original scientific publications and press releases.

Examples

Detailed background research on a topic:

Other group members chiming in: