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Session 27 - History and Teaching of Astronomy.
Oral session, Monday, June 10
Old Madison,
The Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer (RXTE) Learning Center is an Internet resource on the World Wide Web for educators and their students to learn about the fundamental elements of X-ray astronomy, the mission of RXTE, and to share in its discoveries. RXTE is a NASA astrophysics spacecraft mission which studies the physics of compact X-ray sources such as black holes, neutron stars, and active galaxies. The suite of onboard instruments measure the time variation of X-ray emissions over a broad energy range from 2 to 200 keV, with a resolution as fine as ten microseconds. The RXTE Learning Center features lesson plans which illustrate principles of physics and astronomy using non-proprietary data from RXTE and other X-ray missions which are held at the High Energy Science Archive Research Center (HEASARC) at NASA/GSFC. In the lesson plans, currently appropriate for upper level high school and introductory college courses, students utilize data to accomplish some of the same analysis goals as research astronomers. The lesson plans are updated to include the latest results from RXTE, including for example data from the Bursting Pulsar (GRO J1744-28). In addition, guides are provided for educators and students to learn to navigate the HEASARC data archives to create their own materials. The RXTE Learning Center may be accessed via http://heasarc.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/xte/learning_ctr/lrningctr.html.
