A three-week winter school on astrophysics being held on Calicut University campus from January 18 has won the attention of many a serious star watcher. Thanks to the Science and Engineering Research Council of the Department of Science and Technology(DST), as many as 27 astrophysics students from different parts of the country are working in close association with international faculty at the winter school.
The SERC winter school on Nuclear Astrophysics and Neutrino Astrophysics being organised at the Madhava Observatory by the Department of Physics, Calicut University, is part of the Council's five-year plan of holding schools on nuclear physics.
?The primary objective of this school,? explains Prof. B.R.S. Babu, an expert in astrophysics and former head of the Department of Physics, ?is to elevate the academic standard of the students engaged in research in nuclear physics in general, and nuclear astrophysics in particular.?
What makes the winter school attractive is the offering of basic and generic lessons in astrophysics besides the advanced topics. The coming days will have classes on nuclear structure, gravitational waves, and sun and climate.
Among the faculty conducting the winter school are Prof. Claus Rolfs from the University of Bochum, Germany; Prof. U.J. Sofia from American University, Washington; Prof. S.M. Chitre, leading astrophysicist from the Centre for Basic Sciences, Mumbai; Prof. S.B. Patel from the University of Mumbai; Prof. Polash Banerjee, Prof. Kamalesh Kar, Prof. D. Bandhopadhya, and Prof. Pijush Pani Bhattacherji from Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics, Kolkata.