Earth Science, 10e

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Earth Science, 10e

• Edward J. Tarbuck Frederick K. Lutgens

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Beyond our Solar SystemChapter 23

• Earth Science, 10e
• Stan Hatfield and Ken Pinzke
• Southwestern Illinois College

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Properties of stars

• Distance
• Measuring a star's distance can be very difficult
• Stellar parallax
• Used for measuring distance to a star
• Apparent shift in a star's position due to the
  orbital motion of Earth
• Measured as an angle
• Near stars have the largest parallax
• Largest parallax is less than one second of arc

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Properties of stars

• Distance
• Distances to the stars are very large
• Units of measurement
• Kilometers or astronomical units are too
  cumbersome to use
• Light-year is used most often
• Distance that light travels in 1 year
• One light-year is 9.5 trillion km (5.8 trillion
  miles)
• Other methods for measuring distance are also
  used

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Properties of stars

• Stellar brightness
• Controlled by three factors
• Size
• Temperature
• Distance
• Magnitude
• Measure of a star's brightness

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Properties of stars

• Stellar brightness
• Magnitude
• Two types of measurement
• Apparent magnitude
• Brightness when a star is viewed from Earth
• Decreases with distance
• Numbers are used to designate magnitudes - dim
  stars have large numbers and negative numbers are
  also used

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Properties of stars

• Stellar brightness
• Magnitude
• Two types of measurement
• Absolute magnitude
• "True" or intrinsic brightness of a star
• Brightness at a standard distance of 32.6
  light-years
• Most stars' absolute magnitudes are between -5
  and 15

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Properties of stars

• Color and temperature
• Hot star
• Temperature above 30,000 K
• Emits short-wavelength light
• Appears blue
• Cool star
• Temperature less than 3000 K
• Emits longer-wavelength light
• Appears red

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Properties of stars

• Color and temperature
• Between 5000 and 6000 K
• Stars appear yellow
• e.g., Sun
• Binary stars and stellar mass
• Binary stars
• Two stars orbiting one another
• Stars are held together by mutual gravitation
• Both orbit around a common center of mass

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Properties of stars

• Binary stars and stellar mass
• Binary stars
• Visual binaries are resolved telescopically
• More than 50 of the stars in the universe are
  binary stars
• Used to determine stellar mass
• Stellar mass
• Determined using binary stars the center of
  mass is closest to the most massive star

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Binary stars orbit each other around their common
center of mass
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Properties of stars

• Binary stars and stellar mass
• Stellar mass
• Mass of most stars is between one-tenth and fifty
  times the mass of the Sun

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Hertzsprung-Russell diagram

• Shows the relation between stellar
• Brightness (absolute magnitude) and
• Temperature
• Diagram is made by plotting (graphing) each
  star's
• Luminosity (brightness) and
• Temperature

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Hertzsprung-Russell diagram

• Parts of an H-R diagram
• Main-sequence stars
• 90 of all stars
• Band through the center of the H-R diagram
• Sun is in the main-sequence
• Giants (or red giants)
• Very luminous
• Large
• Upper-right on the H-R diagram

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Hertzsprung-Russell diagram

• Parts of an H-R diagram
• Giants (or red giants)
• Very large giants are called supergiants
• Only a few percent of all stars
• White dwarfs
• Fainter than main-sequence stars
• Small (approximate the size of Earth)
• Lower-central area on the H-R diagram
• Not all are white in color
• Perhaps 10 of all stars

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Idealized Hertzsprung-Russell diagram
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Variable stars

• Stars that fluctuate in brightness
• Types of variable stars
• Pulsating variables
• Fluctuate regularly in brightness
• Expand and contract in size
• Eruptive variables
• Explosive event
• Sudden brightening
• Called a nova

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Interstellar matter

• Between the stars is "the vacuum of space"
• Nebula
• Cloud of dust and gases
• Two major types of nebulae
• Bright nebula
• Glows if it close to a very hot star
• Two types of bright nebulae
• Emission nebula
• Reflection nebula

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The Orion Nebula is a well-known emission nebula
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A faint blue reflection nebula in the Pleiades
star cluster
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Interstellar matter

• Nebula
• Two major types of nebulae
• Dark nebula
• Not close to any bright star
• Appear dark
• Contains the material that forms stars and
  planets

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Stellar evolution

• Stars exist because of gravity
• Two opposing forces in a star are
• Gravity contracts
• Thermal nuclear energy expands
• Stages
• Birth
• In dark, cool, interstellar clouds
• Gravity contracts the cloud
• Temperature rises
• Radiates long-wavelength (red) light
• Becomes a protostar

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Stellar evolution

• Stages
• Protostar
• Gravitational contraction of gaseous cloud
  continues
• Core reaches 10 million K
• Hydrogen nuclei fuse
• Become helium nuclei
• Process is called hydrogen burning
• Energy is released
• Outward pressure increases
• Outward pressure balanced by gravity pulling in
• Star becomes a stable main-sequence star

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Stellar evolution

• Stages
• Main-sequence stage
• Stars age at different rates
• Massive stars use fuel faster and exist for only
  a few million year
• Small stars use fuel slowly and exist for perhaps
  hundreds of billions of years
• 90 of a star's life is in the main-sequence

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Stellar evolution

• Stages
• Red giant stage
• Hydrogen burning migrates outward
• Star's outer envelope expands
• Surface cools
• Surface becomes red
• Core is collapsing as helium is converted to
  carbon
• Eventually all nuclear fuel is used
• Gravity squeezes the star

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Stellar evolution

• Stages
• Burnout and death
• Final stage depends on mass
• Possibilities
• Low-mass star
• 0.5 solar mass
• Red giant collapses
• Becomes a white dwarf

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Evolutionary stages of low mass stars
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Stellar evolution

• Stages
• Burnout and death
• Final stage depends on mass
• Possibilities
• Medium-mass star
• Between 0.5 and 3 solar masses
• Red giant collapses
• Planetary nebula forms
• Becomes a white dwarf

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Evolutionary stages of medium mass stars
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H-R diagram showing stellar evolution
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Stellar evolution

• Stages
• Burnout and death
• Final stage depends on mass
• Possibilities
• Massive star
• Over 3 solar masses
• Short life span
• Terminates in a brilliant explosion called a
  supernova
• Interior condenses
• May produce a hot, dense object that is either a
  neutron star or a black hole

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Evolutionary stages of massive stars
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Stellar remnants

• White dwarf
• Small (some no larger than Earth)
• Dense
• Can be more massive than the Sun
• Spoonful weighs several tons
• Atoms take up less space
• Electrons displaced inward
• Called degenerate matter
• Hot surface
• Cools to become a black dwarf

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Stellar remnants

• Neutron star
• Forms from a more massive star
• Star has more gravity
• Squeezes itself smaller
• Remnant of a supernova
• Gravitational force collapses atoms
• Electrons combine with protons to produce
  neutrons
• Small size

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Stellar remnants

• Neutron star
• Pea size sample
• Weighs 100 million tons
• Same density as an atomic nucleus
• Strong magnetic field
• First one discovered in early 1970s
• Pulsar (pulsating radio source)
• Found in the Crab nebula (remnant of an A.D. 1054
  supernova)

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Crab Nebula in the constellation Taurus
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Stellar remnants

• Black hole
• More dense than a neutron star
• Intense surface gravity lets no light escape
• As matter is pulled into it
• Becomes very hot
• Emits x-rays
• Likely candidate is Cygnus X-1, a strong x-ray
  source

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Galaxies

• Milky Way galaxy
• Structure
• Determined by using radio telescopes
• Large spiral galaxy
• About 100,000 light-years wide
• Thickness at the galactic nucleus is about 10,000
  light-years
• Three spiral arms of stars
• Sun is 30,000 light-years from the center

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Face-on view of the Milk Way Galaxy
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Edge-on view of the Milk Way Galaxy
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Galaxies

• Milky Way galaxy
• Rotation
• Around the galactic nucleus
• Outermost stars move the slowest
• Sun rotates around the galactic nucleus once
  about every 200 million years
• Halo surrounds the galactic disk
• Spherical
• Very tenuous gas
• Numerous globular clusters

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Galaxies

• Other galaxies
• Existence was first proposed in mid-1700s by
  Immanuel Kant
• Four basic types of galaxies
• Spiral galaxy
• Arms extending from nucleus
• About 30 of all galaxies
• Large diameter of 20,000 to 125,000 light years
• Contains both young and old stars
• e.g., Milky Way

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Great Galaxy, a spiral galaxy, in the
constellation Andromeda
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Galaxies

• Other galaxies
• Four basic types of galaxies
• Barred spiral galaxy
• Stars arranged in the shape of a bar
• Generally quite large
• About 10 of all galaxies
• Elliptical galaxy
• Ellipsoidal shape
• About 60 of all galaxies
• Most are smaller than spiral galaxies however,
  they are also the largest known galaxies

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A barred spiral galaxy
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Galaxies

• Other galaxies
• Four basic types of galaxies
• Irregular galaxy
• Lacks symmetry
• About 10 of all galaxies
• Contains mostly young stars
• e.g., Magellanic Clouds

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Galaxies

• Galactic cluster
• Group of galaxies
• Some contain thousands of galaxies
• Local Group
• Our own group of galaxies
• Contains at least 28 galaxies
• Supercluster
• Huge swarm of galaxies
• May be the largest entity in the universe

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Red shifts

• Doppler effect
• Change in the wavelength of light emitted by an
  object due to its motion
• Movement away stretches the wavelength
• Longer wavelength
• Light appears redder
• Movement toward squeezes the wavelength
• Shorter wavelength
• Light shifted toward the blue

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Red shifts

• Doppler effect
• Amount of the Doppler shift indicates the rate of
  movement
• Large Doppler shift indicates a high velocity
• Small Doppler shift indicates a lower velocity
• Expanding universe
• Most galaxies exhibit a red Doppler shift
• Moving away

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Raisin bread analogy of an expanding universe
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Red shifts

• Expanding universe
• Most galaxies exhibit a red Doppler shift
• Far galaxies
• Exhibit the greatest shift
• Greater velocity
• Discovered in 1929 by Edwin Hubble
• Hubble's Law the recessional speed of galaxies
  is proportional to their distance
• Accounts for red shifts

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Big Bang theory

• Accounts for galaxies moving away from us
• Universe was once confined to a "ball" that was
• Supermassive
• Dense
• Hot

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Big Bang theory

• Big Bang marks the inception of the universe
• Occurred about 15 billion years ago
• All matter and space was created
• Matter is moving outward
• Fate of the universe
• Two possibilities
• Universe will last forever
• Outward expansion sill stop and gravitational
  contraction will follow

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Big Bang theory

• Fate of the universe
• Final fate depends on the average density of the
  universe
• If the density is more than the critical density,
  then the universe would contract
• Current estimates point to less then the critical
  density and predict an ever-expanding, or open,
  universe

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End of Chapter 23