AST 310 ORIGIN/FATE OF OUR UNIVERSE

A treatment of the fundamental observations and the basic physical and mathematical laws that permit scientists to understand the birth and evolution of our universe. This course will examine how observations over the last 30 years have led to the current "standard model" of an accelerating universe with a non-zero cosmological constant. Topics include the distance ladder, Hubble's law, dark matter, dark energy, the cosmic microwave background, space curvature, The Big Bang, inflation and the first three minutes of cosmic existence.