9352613 Cordes The project involves upgrading a lab course in astronomy that gives students the opportunity to work with state of the art optical and radio astronomy equipment. Work to be done includes the upgrade of existing equipment to improve performance and allow experiments and observations to be performed more efficiently and purchase and construction of new equipment to allow new kinds of observations on astrophysical masers and neutron stars. The signal processing component of the course is being strengthened considerably. Students are able to measure neutral hydrogen from neighboring galaxies for comparison with the rotation curve of our own galaxy. In pulsar observations, students learn about time-transfer technology, dispersive propagation in plasmas, and the rotations of neutron stars. Maser observations teach students about coherent radiation mechanisms. Students are taking part in some of the construction of new equipment, interfacing of equipment to computers, and writing of software. ***
