About Your Instructor
To-Do Date: May 30 at 11:00pmTF Johnson CPhil 
Greetings to all! Call me "TJ" and if you do not feel comfortable with that, call me "Prof Johnson." Either way makes no difference to me.
I am originally from the UK but I have been in this area for a very long time. I can pretty much trace my initial interest in the universe to a series of TIME-LIFE books my elementary school teachers made available for us to read during rainy day recesses. In my mind's eye I can still picture the images of spiral galaxies with the mysterious names.
My parents gave me my first reflecting telescope in fifth form and my first forays into trying to understand the motion of objects in the night time sky began. Fast forward to my first astronomy course here at Solano College which included a field trip to Chabot Observatory and my first look through a large refracting telescope.....I was hooked! Next came Carl Sagan's "Cosmos" television series and book with the same name that I read over and over. Before I knew it I was a teaching assistant in upper division astronomy courses followed by my first forays into basic research performing gamma ray spectroscopy analysis of cosmogenic nuclides. I was doing science guy stuff!!
My current research might seem pretty far removed from astronomy/astrophysics but the equipment I use was developed as part of the response the United States made in entering the space race. I hope to impart some of my enthusiasm for science from any discipline.
Contact information
-
tjohn118@solano.edu
-
Office Hours by appointment: ZOOM