Upper atmosphere & space physics - expected course difficulty?

[quarky2001]

I'm taking this 400 level astrophysics course next semester, and I'm not sure what sort of difficulty level to expect, since I'm unfamiliar with the material.

Any ideas?

The course listing in the calendar reads: "Basic space plasma pheonema: the Earth’s plasma and field environment; the solar cycle; generation of the solar wind; the interplanetary plasma and field environment; the solar-terrestrial interaction; magnetospheric substorms; the aurora borealis; magnetosphere-ionosphere interactions; effects of magnetospheric storms on man-made systems; use of natural electromagnetic fields for geophysical exploration."

The only listed prerequisite for the course is a 3rd year electromagnetic theory course, which at my school is basically the first half of Griffiths' "Electrodynamics" textbook.

 

[fss]

This is not a very meaningful question. Being 400-level, it will probably be fairly challenging. Wasn't that kind of obvious...?

 

[quarky2001]

This is not a very meaningful question. Being 400-level, it will probably be fairly challenging. Wasn't that kind of obvious...?

Okay, well challenging relative to other courses... supposing I'm used to 400-level courses.

For example, two other 400-level courses I took were "Introduction to Condensed Matter Physics" and "Quantum Mechanics B". Needless to say, there was no comparison between the difficulty of the two.

 

[Astronuc]

Without a syllabus or textbook, it is difficult to judge the course difficulty. Ostensibly, one should have an understanding of electrodynamcis and magetodynamics, and perhaps the physics of interactions of radiation with matter, primarily gases and plasmas.

 

[nlsherrill]

Okay, well challenging relative to other courses... supposing I'm used to 400-level courses.

For example, two other 400-level courses I took were "Introduction to Condensed Matter Physics" and "Quantum Mechanics B". Needless to say, there was no comparison between the difficulty of the two.

I agree with you here. My advisers have told me many times that the core 400 level courses (E&M,QM,Thermal,etc) are more difficult than the introductory 500 level graduate courses like Nuclear Physics or Ion physics. If its an elective course, then it PROBABLY won't be as difficult as a core course. Other than that its hard to tell. It really really really depends on the professor and how they give tests/assignments, and most importantly, grade.