How Do Quantum Mechanics and Astrophysics Intersect?

[judonight]

Ok, so I need a topic to present.

I am taking Quantum mechanics, introduction to astrophysics, and a seminar class... I need a topic for a 30-40 minute presentation for each class, and was wondering if there are any interesting topics that tie QM and astro together... thus, one presentation that I can do in all three classes.

I am welcome to any and all ideas!

 

[Ahmes]

Maybe about Fermi pressure in stars, or BB radiation if it counts as Quantum enough... What should the level be, what were the topics covered?

 

[fasterthanjoao]

As per Ahmes, would be good to have a bit more information on what kind of astrophysics you've covered so far? Is this your first astronomy course?

Obviously there's plenty of astrophysical subjects that use quantum mechanics, but if you've covered sufficient material then maybe you have a particular area of interest you'd like to see how it could be applied?

(worth checking I feel, I assume you've already checked you would indeed be allowed to cover at least the same subject in each class?)

 

[judonight]

Yes, the same topic can be used in all three classes.

Astrophysics is an 'intro' class, so yeah, my knowledge is limited. It is basically a topic's class, so we haven't 'covered' much, other than spectroscopy and tools/instruments/satellites/observatories that measure different radiant sources (across the entire spectrum).

This is my first Quantum course as well; although a lot of what we are covering has been covered in a 'modern phyiscs' course that I took last semester. 'Modern physics' was more of an intro to quantum, so I understand the basics... wells, barriers, uncertainty principle, postulates, Schrödinger Equation 1 and 3-D, etc...

All are undergrad classes, so I feel like my knowledge is extremely limited, but I wouldn't say that my boundries to new topics is limited. The assignment for all three classes is the same: we are to find a topic that has been written about in a scientific journal recently (past 5 years or so), understand it well enough that we can present the material and give a review of the article.

I can't say that I have a specific interest in anything, rather I have a broad interest in everything. I do plan on going into Medical physics after my undergrad, but linking medical physics to an astrophysics topic is really stretching it.

TIA!