Notes to supplement study for the MIT astrophysics division oral qualification exam, currently referred to as "the 168". ### Structure Folders are broken down into the sections of the oral exam as they are at the time of writing. These are linked in the interactive graph on the right, and are also listed here: - [[The Solar System - Questions|The Solar System]] - [[Exoplanets - Questions|Exoplanets]] - [[Stars - Questions|Stars and Stellar Evolution]] - [[Compact objects - Questions|Compact Objects and Gravitational Waves]] - [[Emission & the ISM - Questions|ISM/Emission]] - [[Plasma and lensing - Questions|Plasma and Gravitational Lensing]] - [[Galaxies - Questions|Galaxies]] - [[Cosmology - Questions|Cosmology]] - [[Instrumentation and methods - Questions|Instrumentation and Astronomical Methods]] - [[Lightning round|Lightning Round]] Each folder contains the questions in that section, and an answer (which may or may not be correct) that is largely based on the study notes of past students. These questions link to other files containing definitions and other shared ideas, for example one will find many links to the [[CMB]] note, the [[Observatories]] note, and the [[AGN]] note, amongst many others. Additionally we have files which were useful to us in our studies, like [[Mnemonics]], [[Units]], and [[Fun conversions]]. ### Recommended usage 1. **Make your own notes** It is very strongly recommended to make your own full set of notes using these (and those of other students) to make your own study more efficient. These notes do not serve as a replacement. Some people make a set of more detailed notes, then something shorter like a "1 page per question" notebook or something like flash cards. 2. **Ask for help** If something is confusing, ask other grad students or faculty. You could spend a week on any question if you really wanted to, but there's no time for that so to keep things moving smoothly ask confidently and ask often. 3. **Consider working locally** Can use this website, but can also download this vault from [this github repo](https://github.com/CianMRoche/AstroWiki/tree/main) and use locally with the program [Obsidian](https://obsidian.md/). This has the advantage of using canvases, editing, and greater customizability, but most importantly a full text search (rather than just note titles and headings as on the website version). It'll probably also be a bit smoother. 4. **Contribute** You will find mistakes and perhaps even inconsistencies with other students' notes. Please fix them! Then you can submit a pull request on the github repo linked above (best choice, requires downloading the vault in step 3), or just tell me ([email protected]) and I'll update the notes :) 5. **Scheduling is your friend** The value of making a plan with the input of some older students is hard to overstate. This is very much a marathon and not a sprint so working consistently and efficiently will make your life a lot easier. Watch out for the really long sections (cosmology and compact objects primarily). Try not to leave them until close to the end, but also don't get bogged down spending too much time on them. ### Direct Contributors Cian Roche and Meredith Neyer, using and often copying directly material provided by Megan Masterson, Xiaowei Ou, Geoffrey Mo, and Rahul Jayaraman.