Science background

Young Stars

General information

• Studying Young Stars - More information on the study of young stars, by Dr. Luisa Rebull (2011)
• Finding cluster members - Spitzer in particular is so sensitive that it easily sees things at the far reaches of the Universe with only a few seconds' integration. When studying clusters of stars, one of the first major goals is to figure out which objects are truly cluster members and which are not. This page has a discussion of how to find members of young clusters in general. by Dr. Luisa Rebull (2017)
• Taurus catalog - The Taurus Molecular Cloud is one of the nearest star forming regions at only 140 pc away. This page has a catalog of fluxes for these young stars. By Dr. Luisa Rebull (2012)

• Pre-main sequence evolution - Basic introduction to pre-main sequence evolution. By Dr. Luisa Rebull (2012)
• General Background on young stars - By Dr. Luisa Rebull (2007)
• Stars and How They Form - videos with sign language - By Anna McCartney and Lyssa Matsche (2011)

• Dynamical Evolution of Star Clusters - Life of the Pleiades. Covers star cluster dynamics, stellar encounters, stellar evolution... watch with sound!!

Project-specific information

IC2118

IC2118 was one of the very first teacher teams.

• Introduction to IC2118
• Specific IC 2118 information
• Monitoring young stars - The IC 2118 team embarked on a campaign to monitor some of the candidate TTauri stars that we found using Spitzer data. They used ground-based telescopes to see if the stars vary.
• Monitoring T-Tauri Stars using the Remote Observatories
• Generating Light Curves - APT and Excel
• Kitt Peak YSO Research Project
• Galaxy Identification in the Taurus Field

Other teams

• Lynds Target Selection
• Studying Variable Stars - More information on the study of variable stars, light curves, eclipsing binaries, etc.

Galaxies

• Introduction to M81
• Tidal dwarf galaxies
• Galaxy Classification
• Studying AGN - More information on the study of active galactic nuclei (AGN).

Other topics

• Studying Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons -- Many astronomers use the Spitzer Space Telescope to detect or study "polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons," or "PAHs" for short. What are these things? In short, rings of carbon, like the grunge on your grill. But what else are they, and why are they important?