Fall 2023: Physics 805 – Computational and Theoretical Cosmology
Special topics course for physics graduate students.
This course will give an overview of modern cosmology, with a focus on theoretical and computational methods required to analyze data from CMB, large-scale structure and intensity mapping. My goal is to make this course useful for students who are doing research in cosmology or who consider joining this field. Topics include calculating and measuring power spectra, cosmological parameter inference, perturbation theory, halo model, lensing, n-body simulations, and non-Gaussianity from inflation. We will discuss and apply statistical techniques such as estimators, covariances, likelihoods and MCMC, including real world complications such as masks and noise. I will also outline modern developments, such as machine learning based inference and differentiable simulations. No graduate classes are required prerequisites. Undergraduates are welcome but need to know basics such a Fourier transforms, multivariable calculus and elementary statistics. We will use python for programming.
Spring 2023: Physics 104 – General Physics
For non physics majors. Principles of electricity and magnetism, light, optics, and modern physics, with applications to a number of different fields.
Fall 2022: Physics 249 – Introduction to Modern Physics
See below.
Spring 2022: Physics 322 – Electromagnetic Fields
For physics majors. This course covers:
- Vector Calculus
- Electrostatics
- Magnetostatics
- Maxwell’s Equations
following the famous book by David Griffiths.
Fall 2021: Physics 249 – Introduction to Modern Physics
For physics majors. This course covers:
- Special Relativity and basic General Relativity
- Introduction to Quantum Mechanics
- Topics from Atomic Physics and Nuclear Physics
- Topics from Particle Physics
- Topics from Cosmology
This class covers a lot of material somewhat superficially, to get an – hopefully exciting – overview of modern physics before delving deeper into some of these subjects later on.