Enhancing the Book "Coloring the Universe" to Serve Undergraduate Education

首席研究员和合著者金伯利·阿坎德和梅根·瓦茨克正在撰写《着色宇宙》一书，这本书将提供专业天文台如何制作彩色天文图像的幕后故事。有许多展示美丽天文图像的茶几书，但没有一本关注这些图像是如何制作的（天体摄影）。描述图像制作技术的书籍主要是为业余天文学家准备的“如何”书籍，而不是描述潜在的科学。“着色宇宙”将解释如何制作彩色合成图像，科学家如何将其用于可视化目的，以及如何与公众分享这些图像以突出新的科学发现。这本书的独特之处在于，它主要展示了美国国家科学基金会资助的望远镜和用它们拍摄的图像。这项资助将使作者能够改进这本书，使其成为更有用的本科教学工具。他们将增加提供更多信息和例子的内容，他们将创建一个网站，其中包含图像制作教程，学生可以用望远镜获得的数据制作自己的图像，以及一个图片库，让学生和公众分享他们的作品。天文图像提供了一个引人入胜的介绍，在天文学的重要课题，如望远镜和电荷耦合器件（ccd）如何工作，窄带滤波器，和多波长成像。许多有小口径望远镜和CCD相机的大学都有让天文学学生拍摄天体图像的实验练习。这些实验室是教授望远镜和ccd如何工作的重要工具，同时以一种有趣、视觉上吸引人的方式进行。随着内容的增强，“着色宇宙”将成为一种宝贵的资源，不仅可以教授专业人士如何制作图像，还可以教授科学家为什么要这样制作图像。网站上的教程将被整合到阿拉斯加安克雷奇大学的天文学入门课程中，也将呈现给天文学教育小组的教师，例如研究型科学教育小组（RBSE）。

The Principal Investigator and coauthors Kimberly Arcand and Megan Watzke are writing "Coloring the Universe," a book that will provide a behind-the-scenes look at how color astronomical images are made by professional observatories. There are a number of coffee table books showcasing beautiful astronomical images, but none of them focus on how the images are made (astrophotography). Books that do describe image-making techniques are primarily "how to" books intended for amateur astronomers and do not describe the underlying science. "Coloring the Universe" will explain how color-composite images are made, how they are used by scientists for visualization purposes, and how they are shared with the public to highlight new scientific discoveries. The book will also be unique in featuring primarily NSF-funded telescopes and the images made with them. Support from this grant will allow the authors to enhance the book so that it will be more useful as a teaching tool at the undergraduate level. They will add content that provides more information and examples, and they will create a Web site that contains image-making tutorials, data from telescopes with which students can make their own images, and an image gallery allowing students and the public to share their work.Astronomical images offer an engaging introduction to important topics in astronomy, such as how telescopes and charge-coupled devices (CCDs) work, narrowband filters, and multi-wavelength imaging. Many colleges that have access to small-aperture telescopes and CCD cameras have laboratory exercises in which astronomy students make images of astronomical objects. These labs serve as an important tool for teaching how telescopes and CCDs work, while doing it in a fun, visually appealing way. With its enhanced content, "Coloring the Universe" will be a valuable resource for teaching not only how the professionals make images, but why scientists make them the way they do. The tutorials on the Web site will be incorporated into introductory astronomy classes at the University of Alaska Anchorage and will also be presented to instructors in astronomy education groups, such as the Research-Based Science Education (RBSE) group.