Resources for Mentors

An Example Syllabus for a “Special Topics” Astrophysics Course on Dark Matter

We respect that the freedom to design a course is essential to the role of the faculty member. We hope that you find this example syllabus, assuming the Guidebook is used as a resource for the class, helpful in shaping your own approach to developing such a course.

This example uses the inaugural edition of the Guidebook.

Week	Subject Material	Relevant Chapters and Sections of the Guidebook
1	Introduction to Units and Concepts (Review Newton’s Law of Gravity, Special Relativity, and Wave Theory of Light, Particles and Forces in the Standard Model)	Chapter 1
2	Evidence For Dark Matter: Galaxy Clusters	Chapter 2.1-2.2
3	Evidence for Dark Matter: Galaxy Rotation and Halo Models	Chapter 2.3-2.5
4	Evidence for Dark Matter: Synthesis of Information	Chapter 2.6-2.8
5	Evidence for Dark Matter: Cosmic Microwave Background and Synthesis of Light Elements	Chapter 3.1-3.4
6	Constraining Dark Matter’s Properties and Milky Way Dark Matter	Chapters 3.5-3.7, 4.1-4.2
7	Elastic Scattering of Dark Matter and Survey of Detection Approaches	Chapter 4.3-4.4
8	Detector Design and Sample of Direct Detection Approaches	Chapter 4.5-4.8
9	Indirect Detection of Dark Matter	Chapter 5.1-5.4
10	Collider Production of Dark Matter	Chapter 5.5-5.6
11	Non-Particle Dark Matter – the Axion	Chapter 6.1-6.3
12	Non-Particle Dark Matter: Sample of Approaches to Detection	Chapter 6.4-6.5
13	New Approaches to Dark Matter: Sample of Methods	Chapter 7
14	New Approaches to Dark Matter: Sample of Methods	Chapter 7