Astronomy 105 Review for the Lab Exam

Mr. Michaels suggests looking at the questions that you answered each week on your lab reports. The PowerPoint review file that was shown during your last lab can be found here: http://www.physics.sfasu.edu/michaels/ast_105/html/slides_lab.html

See your lab syllabus for the exam date and time. Be sure to bring a pencil and a scantron form. There will be between 30 and 50 questions. There will be about 3-5 questions from each lab exercise.

Things to Consider

Lab 1 - Experimental Measurements Review precision, significant figures, scientific notation, etc.
Lab 2 - Constellations/Star Charts Review the Star Chart SC001 features (RA, DEC, Celestial Sphere, Equinoxes, Solstices, Ecliptic, etc.)
Lab 3 - The Moon: Review the rise, set and transit times of moon phases.
Lab 4 - Kepler’s Laws: Review the geometry of the Ellipse Diagram.
Lab 5 - Emission Spectra: Review the types of sources that give Emission, Absorption, and Continuous Spectra.
Lab 6 - The Earth’s Orbital Velocity: Review the Doppler Effect and Arcturus’ spectra.
Lab 7 - The H-R Diagram: Review the H-R diagrams (Main Sequence, Spectral types, etc.)
Lab 8 - Distance to the Pleiades: Review the methods of determining distance.
Lab 9 - Age and Distance of Clusters: Review the methods or determining distance and ages of clusters.
Lab 10 - Hubble's Law: what is Hubble's Law and what measurements were used to discover it?
Lab 11 - Rotation of Saturn: Review the Doppler effect and the spectrum of Saturn.

How to Prepare for the Laboratory Exam

Know the purpose of each laboratory experiment.
Study the introduction to each experiment.
Know the basic principles that are being used in each experiment.
Know the definition of physical terms used in each experiment.
Know in general the procedures followed in each experiment.
Don’t memorize the data obtained in the individual experiments, but do know how to get results from example data that might be given to you.
Know how the results you obtained depended on the conditions set in the experiment.
These suggestions are not meant to be all-inclusive, but following these should give you a reasonable chance of making a good grade on the laboratory exam.