Courses Catalogue

Syllabus of the course: Production and Transfer of Radiation


In this web page we provide the syllabus of the course Production and Transfer of Radiation, offered by the Department of Physics.
The list of the courses offered during the current accademic year is available here.
The list of all courses offered by the Department of Physics is available here.

CodeΦ-532
TypeB
ECTS5
Hours4
SemesterSpring
InstructorI. Vardavas
ProgramMonday 13:00-15:00, Room 4
Friday 13:00-15:00, Room 4
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Goal of the course

The class is an introduction to radiative transfer in stellar and planetary atmospheres. Radiation ultimately determines the climate of planets and the structure of stellar atmospheres. The course focuses on the physics of production and transfer of radiation through absorption, scattering, and emission from atmos and molecules. Students are given four homework sets, which constitute important elements of the class.

SyllabusRadiation definitions
Specific intensity, mean intensity, flux, absorption, emission, and scattering (Rayleigh, Mie, Thomson, Compton), absorption coefficient, emission coefficient.

Transfer of Radiation
Radiative transfer equation; optical depth; source function; solution examples; Schwarzschild-Milne equations; Eddington approximations; two-stream, LTE-grey atmospheres, diffusivity aprroximation, diffusion approximation.

Production of Radiation
Thermal emission, thermal radiation, absorption and emission Einstein coefficients, spectral line broadening, bound-bound transitions, ionization, free-free transitions, Hydrogen lines.

Astrophysical applications
Nebulae, interstellar medium, X-ray sources, X-ray production mechanisms, evolution of solar luminosity.
BibliographyRadiation and Climate, I.M. Vardavas, and F.W. Taylor, International Series of Monographs on Physics Νο. 138, Oxford University Press, 2007.
Lecture notes.

University of Crete - Department of Physics  - Voutes University Campus - GR-70013 Heraklion, Greece
phone: +30 2810 394300 - email: chair@physics.uoc.gr