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Learner Reviews & Feedback for Data-driven Astronomy by The University of Sydney

4.8
stars
1,382 ratings

About the Course

Science is undergoing a data explosion, and astronomy is leading the way. Modern telescopes produce terabytes of data per observation, and the simulations required to model our observable Universe push supercomputers to their limits. To analyse this data scientists need to be able to think computationally to solve problems. In this course you will investigate the challenges of working with large datasets: how to implement algorithms that work; how to use databases to manage your data; and how to learn from your data with machine learning tools. The focus is on practical skills - all the activities will be done in Python 3, a modern programming language used throughout astronomy. Regardless of whether you’re already a scientist, studying to become one, or just interested in how modern astronomy works ‘under the bonnet’, this course will help you explore astronomy: from planets, to pulsars to black holes. Course outline: Week 1: Thinking about data - Principles of computational thinking - Discovering pulsars in radio images Week 2: Big data makes things slow - How to work out the time complexity of algorithms - Exploring the black holes at the centres of massive galaxies Week 3: Querying data using SQL - How to use databases to analyse your data - Investigating exoplanets in other solar systems Week 4: Managing your data - How to set up databases to manage your data - Exploring the lifecycle of stars in our Galaxy Week 5: Learning from data: regression - Using machine learning tools to investigate your data - Calculating the redshifts of distant galaxies Week 6: Learning from data: classification - Using machine learning tools to classify your data - Investigating different types of galaxies Each week will also have an interview with a data-driven astronomy expert. Note that some knowledge of Python is assumed, including variables, control structures, data structures, functions, and working with files....

Top reviews

DA

Sep 17, 2020

Very Nice course, materials well explained though the programming exercises were very difficult for me, as I did not had that much in depth knowledge of python, for which I had to take additional help

SK

Sep 10, 2020

Really amazing course! Gave me insights into how data analysis works in the field of astronomy and how one can use different machine learning techniques to classify the huge amounts of data generated.

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126 - 150 of 395 Reviews for Data-driven Astronomy

By Iain J M

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Oct 20, 2024

Great course, lots of hands-on work with astronomical data, a good lead-in to a basic astronomy kaggle, for example. Compact, well structured, would be interested to study further with these professors.

By Devarajan R

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Aug 12, 2024

Very good. Helps a lot if you know a little bit of astronomy or astrophysics. The video lectures were very neat and precise. Learnt a lot on how data analysis is critical to Astronomical observations

By Stephen S

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Jul 1, 2020

Excellent course. I am fairly new to Python and the programming exercises for very good for learning the language. I particularly enjoyed the Grok platform for learning the language. It was easy to use

By Deleted A

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Sep 18, 2020

Very Nice course, materials well explained though the programming exercises were very difficult for me, as I did not had that much in depth knowledge of python, for which I had to take additional help

By Madhav C

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Feb 29, 2020

Its been amazing to learn about the celestial objects, stars, galaxies. The lectures and quizzes spurred in me to explore new material online. Great hands on exercises in python and machine learning

By Valerio P

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Nov 29, 2022

I truly enjoyed learning more  about the two things I love the most: data analysis as part of my daily job and astronomy, my personal passion since I was a child. Thanks a lot for this opportunity!

By Lena

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Jul 25, 2022

Data-driven astronomy is a useful course about necessary instruments in modern science and work in general. If you want to learn about Python, SQL and machine learning - this course is for you!

By Siva S

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Oct 22, 2021

This course is exceptionally good, well developed and structured. The content of the course is good. The teachers have demonstrated the concept well. I would like to learn more on this concept.

By Chyawan H

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Nov 10, 2024

It was a really great experience. As a person with less knowledge in computing, but quite good at the theoretical aspects of astronomy, this course was a good collab of both of those things.

By U R

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Mar 3, 2021

I really appreciate the structure and content of this course. It gave me very good insight into data driven astronomy, programming language (Python), libraries eg NumPy and machine language.

By Harald v F

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Sep 16, 2019

Excellent course taking us into the realms of big data, computational methods even database and SQL, I enjoyed it very much. Especially the hands-on exercises are very valuable.

Thanks a lot!

By Brandon F

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Aug 11, 2019

Such a wonderful course. It had a very good mix of astronomy and computer science. The programming activities were especially good and the lectures were very informative. I highly recommend.

By Olexander T

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Apr 16, 2020

Super nice and interesting course! I don't have any astronomy background and found it very fun and interesting to apply my analytics skills in astronomy) Thanks a lot for such a fun course!

By Victor A N P

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Dec 28, 2020

What a wonderful MOOC. It's actually quite surprising, very hands-on. It was a blast for me, since I'm keen on astronomy and a computer engineering student trying to build a career in AI.

By Pratik S

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Oct 12, 2020

This is such an amazing course which helps me to improve my astronomical knowledge and improving my coding skills as well. I'm glad that I came across this course.

Thank you so much !!!

By Sam H

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Feb 16, 2023

A very good introductory course for data analysis in astronomy for people without prior knowledge of Astro or data analysis. But this course does require some basic python knowledge.

By Yudisthira

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Aug 31, 2020

very comprehensive course, a little bit advance but in general beginner like me can catch up the course with an effort.

the improvement I gain after enroll this course is outstanding

By Mir S H

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Mar 4, 2021

Data-driven Astronomy is an amazing course which will help you to acquire a good knowledge in Astronomy and Data Science with their applications. Hope all the people will enjoy it.

By Kingshuk m

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May 19, 2020

Very well structured course. Effectively combines the physics of astronomy with computational tools. Really enjoyed and got inspired listening to the interviews with astronomers.

By Bartosz P

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Jul 23, 2019

It's a nice and short intro to both astronomy and analysing data with python. For me it was a too short because I would like to learn more about this topic, but totally worth it.

By Joe B

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Mar 6, 2023

This might be my favorite astronomy course, probably because it combines my two great interests, astronomy and computer programming. The course was a lot of fun; learned alot.

By Arthur O

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Jan 27, 2020

Great introductory course about different real world problems faced in the field of Astornomy and how different technologies and computational solutions can be applied to them.

By ABDUL J K

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Apr 25, 2020

An amazing course! Was a bit challenging at first, but it didn't take long for me to get the hang of it. Was quite interesting and informative throughout. Absolutely loved it!

By Pierre G

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Feb 1, 2021

Match with the description given.

Each week, some astronomical stuff are presented and then we learned who to recognize those proprieties in a data set thanks to computing.

By denis m i g

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Aug 3, 2022

Un excelente curso de astrofísica enfocado en el análisis de datos, practico, moderno y ágil. Recomendadísimo para estudiantes de grado y posgrado de física y astronomía.