Open Problems in Modern Astrophysics

Course manual 2020/2021

Course content

A different cutting-edge astrophysical topic will be discussed each week, presented by a lecturer who is an expert in that research field. At the start of each week the lecturer will introduce a topic, giving sufficient background to enable students to read a recent breakthrough research paper in the field. Students will be asked to read the paper, in preparation for an in-depth class discussion in the second session of the week. Each week a small group of nominated students will be asked to give a presentation on the key points of the paper.  The rest of the class will participate in asking questions and further discussion. After the presentation and in-class discussion, the presenting students will write a short report on the main points of the paper.  Students should expect to present a paper twice during the course.

In between the Monday and Friday, the presenter groups need to prepare for the discussion meeting. The following schedule should be used:
1. By Thursday of the previous week: the lecturer/TA communicates details of the paper to be discussed and possible background materials.
2. Before the Monday: all students in the class read the paper and the presenter group prepare to meet with the lecturer.
3. Monday lecture: the lecturer presents and discusses the background for the paper with all students.
4. No later than Thursday 17h: the presenter groups meet and flesh out a plan for the content of the Friday presentations. They should also meet with the lecturer to discuss this, in time to still change the plans in response to lecturer input.
5. Friday: the presenter groups give a 15 minute presentation on the paper in their respective discussion sessions. Following this, the group discussion may continue in an ad hoc way. Throughout the whole discussion, active participation is encouraged and expected from the whole class, and all class members are to raise questions. The lecturer and TA will sit in and help guide the discussion if necessary.
6. Between the Friday of the presentation and the Friday of the following week (at 17h): the presenter groups prepare and submit to the lecturer and TA via email a brief referee report for the paper (3 pages).

In general, classes will be held online for lecture and presentations.  Breakout rooms will be used for the smaller discussion rounds.  If convenient and possible, the meeting of the presenter group with the lecturer (point 4 above) could be on campus.  

Deadlines for preparation and submission should be taken very seriously. They can be exceeded only in emergencies and, even then, only with prior notification of the lecturer and agreement on a new deadline.

Study materials

Other

• Research papers.

Objectives

• Summarize open problems in modern astrophysics
• Describe research being done to address open problems
• Design effective presentation slides
• Clearly articulate the key points and issues of a journal paper
• Actively participate in scientific debate in a professional manner
• Constructively critique research papers
• Justify recommendations for improving research papers

Teaching methods

• Lecture
• Seminar

Learning activities

Attendance

Requirements concerning attendance (OER-B).

Additional requirements for this course:

All students must participate in all classes – part of the grade will be based on attendance; absences must be reported to the TA in advance and are allowed only for emergency matters. The course grade will be determined by the grades for the presentations and reports a student contributes to (2/3 of the weight) and by the quality of their general participation in the discussion, i.e. not as part of the presenter groups (1/3 of the weight).

Assessment

Assignments

The referee report

Your referee report is essentially a letter that you are writing to the editor (not the authors!) advising them how to proceed with the manuscript. If you have reservations about the paper, or things are unclear, think carefully about what you need to see in order to amend this, giving clear suggestions for the authors to consider. For example: “Figure X is unclear.” is not as helpful as “Figure X is unclear. Please make the figure axes labels bigger and use a colour-blind-friendly colour scheme or use different symbols.”. Another example: “I don’t understand how the authors arrived at this number.” - try instead “It is not clear from the manuscript how the final values were obtained. Please detail the steps and any derivations or assumptions used to arrive at them." For this course, the referee report written by the presenting groups should typically be 3 pages long, and not more than 1500 words in total (figures aren't necessary but may be included if the students find them useful to convey something important). The report gives a brief overview of the paper but mainly summaries the answers to the questions asked during the presentation. The presenter groups must write these reports independently! When writing the report, the students could consider the following simple layout (this is not set in stone though: students should feel free to use a different format if they feel it works better):

Introduction (<1 pages): Give a brief overview of the topic of the paper and put it into context, i.e. are the results presented in the paper important and interesting? This part is key. Summarise in a few sentences why (or why not) the editor should consider publishing this scientific manuscript in their journal.

Discussion, split into major comments and minor comments, where the former must be addressed prior to publication and the latter are suggestions to the authors. Content could include (but is not exclusive to):

• Are the explanations easy to understand and is the paper well written?

• Key open questions from the paper with suggestions how these could be pursued

• Are the results/interpretation/model plausible? Why / why not?

• Issues related to readability and clarity of the presentation

• Is there anything additional that you would like to see in the paper?

Conclusion: The presenter groups should finish the report with a paragraph giving their own view about the paper. Being critical is fine (this is part of the process of developing their own scientific opinion) and it's also fine to express uncertainty (or be wrong!), the main thing here is to give the reasoning behind their opinion.

Grading (out of 10): 1-5 is unsatisfactory: not a passing grade. 6 means the students did the bare minimum but didn’t really get to grips with the material or understand it except at a superficial level. 7 shows a better understanding of the questions answered, they could make some basic critical points (the more obvious ones), but didn’t go beyond what was asked. 8-10 shows increasing levels of deeper understanding, they were able to take the topic significantly beyond what was covered in the intro lecture and were able to think deeply and critically about the paper.

Feedback: Approximately one week after submission, the students will receive the guest-lecturers grading of the report, following the scheme above and preferably with a bit of motivation.

Fraud and plagiarism

The 'Regulations governing fraud and plagiarism for UvA students' applies to this course. This will be monitored carefully. Upon suspicion of fraud or plagiarism the Examinations Board of the programme will be informed. For the 'Regulations governing fraud and plagiarism for UvA students' see: www.student.uva.nl

Course structure

Timetable

The schedule for this course is published on DataNose.

Contact information

Coordinator

• dr. Oliver Porth

Staff

• Ben Sutlieff