MathCAD is one of several useful computer-based mathematics programs that can evaluate complex math expressons either symbolically or numerically (others incude Mathematica, Matlab, Maple, and IDL.) I find that the math-like syntax and display in MathCAD can be learned very quickly by beginning undergraduates, but is sufficiently powerful that it ican be used throughout undergraduate and graduate physics and astrophysics courses and even for graduate thesis research.
MathCAD Tutorial
Here's a simple MathCAD tutorial that can be viewed in a web browser or downloaded MathCAD tutorial (click)
Tutorial.mcd (Right-click, MathCAD 11)
MathCAD in Astrophysics: demonstration talk
In February 2005, I gave a seminar to UI faculty and graduate students demonstrating the use of MathCAD in solving problems in astrophysics. Topics include first-order ordinary differential equations, least-squares weighted fitting of data, phase structure functions, fourier analysis, calculation of vector operators (divergence, curl, gradent), as well as a simple tutorial page. Click here for a table with pointer to each topic in the talk. (MathCAD 11).
Astronomy Course Worksheets
These worksheets were written to supplant the often inadequate textbook quantitative material in beginning astronomy textbooks, especially for major-level classes. Click on the HTML column to open a web page version or right-click to download the MathCAD document. Note: Most worksheets were written using version 13 MathCAD, but some are written using earlier versions. All worksheets should be readable using MathCAD 13. Note: This table will be populated as I find time!
| Title | MathCAD worksheet | Level | Other Materials |
|---|---|---|---|
| Angles | Angles | Elementary | |
| Gravitational Redshift, time dilation | Redshift | Intermediate | |
| Galaxies: rotation curves, dark matter | Galaxies-1 | Intermediate | |
| Radiation laws | Radiation | Elementary | |
| Early Universe | Early_universe | Intermediate | |
| Galaxies:Standard candles, Hubble law | Galaxies-2 | Elementary | |
| Latitude, longitude | Coords-1 | Elementary | |
| Notes on special relativity | Special-relativity | Intermediate | |
| Gas laws | Gas-laws | Elementary | |
| Gravitation black holes | Black-holes | Elementary | |
| Neutron stars, pulsars | NS-pulsars | Intermediate | |
| Gravity: Kepler's third law | Kepler-1 | Elementary | |
| Optics, telescopes | Optics | Elementary | |
| Stellar Properties | Stellar-0 | Elementary | |
| Stellar Evolution 1 | Stellar-1 | Intermediate | |
| Stellar Evolution 2 | Stellar-2 | Intermediate | |
| Active galaxies, Gravitational lenses | AGN-lenses | Intermediate | |
| Synodic, sidereal periods, celestial coordinates | Coords-2 | Elementary | |
| Mass from orbit | Kepler-2 | Elementary | |
| Celestial Mechanics -3 star solution | 3-star-solution | Intermediate | Am. J. Phys. article |
| Newton's Method | Newton-method | Intermediate | |
| Light curve fitting routine | LC-fit | Advanced | |
| Azimuth-Elevation to Galactic coordinates | Azel-galactic | Intermediate | |
| 2-dimensional grid model fit | 2-d-grid-fit | Intermediate | |
| Asteroid light curve multi epoch fitting | LC-multi-fit | Advanced | |
| Eclipsing binary ephemeris | Ecl-bin-ephem | Advanced | |
| Linear fitting with outlier: Chauvenet''s criterion | Linfit-outlier | Advanced |