Course Information of PHYS 2021 - Black Holes and the Early Universe

Current / Most Recent Semester: Fall 2014/15
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Instructor(s): Michael Kwok Yee WONG
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Teaching Pattern:
  • duration of course: about 13 weeks
  • lecture hour(s) per week: 3
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    No. of Credit(s): 3
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    Content:
  • Introduction to black hole Physics
  • The concept of symmetry
  • Postulates of special relativity (principle of relativity, the constancy of the speed of light)
  • Lorentz transformation
  • Paradoxes (including length contraction, time dilation and twin paradox)
  • Principle of equivalence
  • Gravity as spacetime curvature
  • Mathematics of curved spacetime
  • Einstein field equations
  • Black holes as stellar collapse
  • The Schwarzschild solution & journey towards Schwarzschild black holes
  • Kruskal coordinates
  • Penrose diagram
  • Rotating black holes
  • Hawking radiation
  • Olberˇ¦s paradox
  • Hubble law
  • Cosmic microwave background radiation
  • Abundance of light elements
  • Cosmological principle
  • Friedman equation
  • Big bang
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    Remarks:
  • Exclusion: PHYS 4054
  • Prerequisite: A passing grade in *AL Physics or any 000-/1000- level Physics courses
  • * AL ˇV Advanced Level of Hong Kong Advanced Level Examination