27/2/2019 Crashed a an Undergraduate Astronomy Class

Crashed an ASTR 500 Introduction to Astronomy. On my path to become a radio Astronomer I am fretted by the fact that I dont have a formal Astronomy background. My understanding of Astronomy is limited to reading popular science books like A Brief History of the Universe by J.P. McEvoy, + Lucky Planet by David Waltham, TIME: New Frontiers of Space, Our Cosmic Origins by Armand Delsemme. Also shout out to Nikos Prantzos who wrote our Cosmic Future.

Armand Delsemme studied Comets which gives him insight to talk about how Life Arose on Planet Earth.

These Books, although fun and insightful count little in the way of a formal education in Astronomy.

My Background is in Electronics Engineering Majoring in Microwave Communications, and with 2 

years grappling with some data processing (python) and web technologies(NodeJS and Express Framework).

So, on my way down from WS Science building I saw a notice on the screen that lists all ongoing lectures. It showed ASTR 500 Introduction to Astronomy was just about to start.

I went in as the class was starting and placed myself in the back, hopefully out of notice of the professor.

The class was taught by Dr. Jordan Alexander of the IRASR Institute. We were asked to Introduce ourselves. Here's what I said:

"Hi, my name is Afiq and I'm an engineer. I read Carl Sagan's Cosmos once I thought that was cool..."

And then we were off on our journey...

Hand Gestures FTW

Kicking it with the youngins

We had an exercise where we shrank the radius of the Earth down to 1 meter. Then marked the position of some things:

• Deepest Ocean Trench
• Height of Sky Scraper
• Tallest Mountains
• Low Earth Orbit/ ISS Operating height.

Also, I learned how to find shit in the Universe: Right Ascension and Declination.

Many of my follow up blogs will probably involve some things I learn from ASTR 500

26/2/2019 My Schedule this Semester at AUT:

Hello Darkness My Old Friend

Auckland University of Technology Masters (MSC) in Research Program is 2 years with first year being subjects and 2nd year being thesis year.

First Year is divided into 2 Semesters. First Semester Subjects 4 subjects lasting until July 2019 and and 2nd year also 4 subjects lasting until November of 2019.

According to Dr. Alna van der Merwe (Super Nice Woman) who is the Program Coordinator the program should play out something like this:

Semester 1:

• COMP 805 Data Mining and Machine Learning:
  
  How to Automate Decision Making. I have experience in Web Scraping.
  
• STAT 805 Computational Mathematics and Statistics:
  
  Every Scientist (I like to call us explorers of the unknown) must have a fine grasp on Statistics. Introduction to R. R is a programming Language for Statistical Computing commonly used by data miners for big data analysis.
  
• MATH 803 Mathematical Modelling and Simulation
  
  Investigates mathematical methods for building models suitable for problems in naturalsciences, engineering and social sciences. Mathematical software packages and computing algorithms are used to analyse and simulate mathematical models. This paper will be taught using SAS software or equivalent.
  
• ASTR 800 Advanced Topics in Astronomy
  
  Taught by the Institute. Working with an Institute Member. Perhaps I will be involved in finding out ways of identifying amd removing RFI (Radio Frequency Interfrence) or perhaps I will be building a data pipeline. Maybe study Pulsars or the Interstellar Medium?
  
  What is a Pulsar?
  
  Pulsars are a small type of Star discovered by Jocelyn Bell and Antony Hewish, made of lots of neutrons that are packed very closely together after a star has died
  
  They spin periodically (while slowing down) in an intense magnetic field  while emitting beams of RF Energy which are detectable from Earth.
  
  Comes in many different flavours (X Ray, Gamma, Optical)
  
  

Semester 2:

• COMP 810 Data Warehousing: SQL
• COMP 811 Research Methods (Write an mini Astro Paper)
• ??? 
• ???

Question Marks are Electives of which i'm gravitating towards STAT  802 Geocomputation and COMP 815 Nature Inspired Computing.

Nature Inspired Computing will involved Artificial Intelligence and Neural Networks. I'm the kind of guy who enjoys nature hikes. I have a friend who once told me that "Just because you enjoy video games, doesn't mean you will enjoy making video games"

But here's the catch. Dr. Alna Recommended that perhaps I change MATH 803 for a course on Digital Signals Processing designate ENSE 807 with Matlab

So Maybe the Semester will look like this:

• COMP 809 Data Mining and Machine Learning
• STAT 805 Computational Math and Statistics
• ASTR 800 Advanced Topics in Astronomy
• ENSE 807 Digital Signal Processing

I have until Friday 1st of March to Decide

25/2/2019 First Day at AUT

I'm on this path in life and I want to be an Astronomer because I think its the coolest Job in the Universe.

Today was my first day at Auckland University of Technology under their 2 year 240 pts Masters in Research Program Astronomy Course.

The Course will put me under the Institute for Radio Astronomy and Space Research (IRASR) which is a pretty small team the Office of Which id located in the International Students Center office next to the AUT Law Building.

Front Door of the Institute

Today I met with some Key members of the Institute, Including.

• Professor Gulyaev: He's the Boss. The Big Boss. Like Korolev, and Stalin. combined.
• Dr.  Willem Van Straten. He's doing Research on Pulsars and Pulsar Timing Arrays. Does work on Fast Radio Bursts Too. which is one of the key mysteries in Astronomy today.
• Mr. Tim Natusch
• Mdm Patricia Sallis: Institute Administrator 
• Natalia (Nat) from Ukraine. An Associate Researcher

Can't lie i felt kind of intimidated with the the meetup. I've waited a long time to get a chance at being an Astronomer and these are real Astronomers, cut of the same creed and cult as legendary people such as Carl Sagan, George Gamow and Edwin Hubble.

I am to be one among them. Stay tuned to see how it goes.

I've been given Homework to study these papers:

• SPINN: Straightforward Machine Learning Solution towards Pulsar Candidate Selection Problem

• Towards Deeper Neural Networks Towards Fast Radio Burst Detection (FRB)
  
  Fast Radio Bursts are Sudden Signals that Appear to originate from Extragalactic Sources. Investigating FRBs may enable us to unlock the mysteries of the Interstellar Medium (The Space Between Stars) and the IGM (The Space Between Galaxies)

A flash in the pan, a whisper in the Cosmic scan, then Nothing.