Astronomy & Astrophysics Program Mathematical Sciences Institute, ANU Summer Vacation Scholarships

These scholarships are offered by the Faculty of Science and are for students currently enrolled in undergraduate studies in universities in Australia and New Zealand and who are in their third or fourth year of a full-time course leading to an honours degree. If you are interested, you can obtain further information from the ANU Graduate School. If you are interested to spend the summer working on an astronomical project in the Mathematical Sciences Institute, please E-mail us: lilia@maths.anu.edu.au As a Summer Vacation Scholar, you can be involved in our various Research Activities . These include observational and theoretical aspects of accretion onto compact objects such as white dwarfs, neutron stars and black holes. You can learn how matter escapes from the compact object's companion star and swirls around, forming a disc of accreting material, before it is engulfed by the compact star. You can discover the effects that super strong magnetic fields have on the infalling material and about the powerful X-Ray radiation that is emitted when matter crashes on to the neutron stars or the magnetic white dwarf or approaches the event horizon of a black hole. Using a telescope, you can view the known universe's strongest magnets and test quantum mechanics calculations of the hydrogen atom under extreme conditions, which are still not reproducible in terrestrial labs. Using various cosmological theories, you can learn about the birth, life and death of our universe. Alternatively, you can find out some of the evidence for organic material in interstellar space and on comets. Honours Program Postgraduate Program Scholarships Back to Astronomy & Astrophysics contact: lilia@maths.anu.edu.au