astronomy 1010
it is closest to the Sun in its orbit and it is moving the fastest in its orbit around the Sun.
A planet in orbit around the Sun experiences the perihelion point when
far from the Sun.
According to Kepler's 2nd Law, comets (which have eccentric orbits) should spend a lot more of their time:
distance from the Sun
According to Kepler's third law, there is a relationship between the time a planet takes to revolve around the Sun and its
Moons around the planet Jupiter
According to the geocentric view, everything in the heavens had to go around the Earth, which was the center of the universe. What objects did Galileo discover with his telescope that clearly didn't go around the Earth?
inversely proportional to the square of the distance between objects.
According to the universal law of gravitation the force due to gravity is
1300 km/hr
Approximately how fast are you moving with the rotation of Earth?
8
Approximately how many minutes does it take light to travel from the Sun to the Earth?
will follow Newton's laws of motion
Astronomers discover a new comet that orbits the Sun but has its aphelion beyond Neptune. Astronomers studying this comet have the right to expect that it
degrees. arcseconds. Arcminutes
Astronomers measure the apparent separation of objects in the sky using
Light travels at a constant speed.
Astronomers observe a supernova explosion that is 100 lightyears away and they deduce that the star exploded 100 years ago. What principle of light guides this knowledge?
heliocentric
Copernicus developed the idea and simplified the understanding of planetary motion by creating a Sun-centered model, also known as
the number of protons in its nucleus.
For scientists, an element (like gold) is defined by
At the north celestial pole.
From a city in the U.S., where in the sky would you look to see a star that is not turning with the motion of the sky in the course of a night?
Tycho Brahe
He was the first to prove that comets lie beyond Earth's atmosphere.
Hot gas shoots out from the rocket and by conservation of momentum the shuttle moves in the opposite direction.
How does the Space Shuttle take off
230 million years
How long does it take our solar system to complete one orbit around the Milky Way Galaxy?
26000 years
How long is the Earth's precessional period?
3600
How many arcseconds in one degree?
4 AU
If a planet has an orbital period of 8 years how far from the Sun is it?
daytime in Sydney Australia
If it is midnight in New York, it is?
18 degrees
If the Earth was tilted 18 degrees from vertical to the ecliptic plane instead of 23.4 degrees what is the angle between the celestial equator and the ecliptic?
more than all the sand on all the beaches on Earth
If you represented each star by a grain of sand how much sand would it take to represent all the stars in the universe?
60 kg
If your mass is 60 kg on Earth what would your mass be on the Moon?
the eccentricity
In an ellipse, the ratio of the distance between the foci and the length of the major axis is called
latitude of the observer
In the Northern Hemisphere, the altitude (height in degrees) of the North Star is always roughly equal to the
while falling from a roof
In which of the following cases would you feel weightless?
The observable universe is 14 billion light years in each direction so the actual universe is greater than 14 billion light years across.
Is the actual size of the universe larger than 14 billion light years?
mass times velocity
Momentum is defined as
in late December
On a cosmic calendar in which the history of the universe is compressed into 1 year when did the dinosaurs become extinct
the average distance of the Earth and the Sun.
One astronomical unit is
the location of Earth in its orbit
Orion is visible on winter evenings in the northern hemisphere but not summer evenings because of
distance to a nearby star
Parallax is the apparent displacement of a nearby star that results from the motion of Earth around the Sun and can be used as a measure of the
developed a model of the solar system that made sufficiently accurate predictions of planetary positions to remain in use for many centuries.
Ptolemy was important in the history of astronomy because he
epicycles.
Ptolemy's model of planetary motion explained the retrograde motion of some of the planets using
100 billion
Roughly how many stars are in the Milky Way Galaxy?
The south circumpolar zone.
Someone who observes the sky every clear night in Boston for many years will NEVER get to see:
1.5 AU
Suppose a planet has an orbital period of 687 days. What is the closest value to its semimajor axis?
the one that is farthest away
Suppose we look at a photograph of many galaxies. Assuming that all galaxies formed at about the same time which galaxy in the picture is the youngest?
200 N
Suppose you visit the planet Mercury and your originally weigh 530 N on Earth. How much would you weigh (in Newtons) on that planet? Mercury's weight is about 1/20th of the Earth and its radius is about 1/3 of that of the Earth.
Tycho Brahe
The 17th century astronomer who kept a roughly 20 year continuous record of the positions of the Sun
constellations.
The 88 sectors into which astronomers today divide the celestial sphere are called
the average distance between the Earth and the Sun.
The Astronomical Unit (AU) as defined by astronomers is
there are universal laws of physics that govern the universe.
The Cosmological Principle can be summarized to say...
kg
The SI unit of mass is
ecliptic path
The Sun's apparent path around the celestial sphere is called
ellipses, parabolas, and hyperbolas
The allowed shapes for orbits under the force of gravity are
predict human events.
The ancient goal of astrology was to?
astrology.
The belief that the position of the stars among the zodiac and the planets influence events in our lives is called
the planet on which we live is rotating.
The celestial sphere turns once around each day because
the time it takes a planet to travel once around the Sun
The definition of the orbital period is
Due to the tilt of the Earth's axis on its orbital plane.
The ecliptic and the celestial equator have a point in which the imaginary lines are separated by a maximum of 23.5 degrees. Why does the value equal 23.5 degrees?
weakens by a factor of 4
The force of gravity is an inverse square law. This means that if you double the distance between two large masses the gravitational force between them
inertia.
The idea that objects (in the absence of an outside force) tend to continue doing what they are already doing is called the law of
measuring the orbital period and distance of one of Jupiter's moons
The mass of Jupiter can be calculated by
24 hours
The orbital period of a geosynchronus sattelite is
mathematical calculations of how it was perturbing the motion of a neighbor planet.
The planet Neptune was discovered by means of:
celestial equator
The projection of the Earth's equator on to the celestial sphere is known as the
precession
The slow tipping of Earth's axis in a circle with a period of about 26,000 year is called:
the sun
The star that provides energy for life on Earth is...
the summer solstice.
The time of the year when the Sun is the highest in the sky for a person in the Northern Hemisphere and one of the points in which the celestial equator and ecliptic are 23.5 degrees apart.
the point in the sky directly overhead regardless of your location on Earth.
The zenith is
it will remain in its orbit forever.
Theoretically without any friction or air drag acting on an artificial satellite that has been launched into a particular orbit of any height
the distance from the Moon's center to its surface. the size of the Moon's orbit around the Earth. the mass of the Moon. 2 of the above factors
To figure out what you weight on the surface of the Moon, you need to know
are further investigated and questioned by other scientists
Using the scientific method, scientists develop new theories that...
Latitude and Longitude
We can describe a position on Earth's surface by stating its?
observations that can be tested or proven to be true
What do scientists mean by verifiable observations?
All galaxies are increasingly moving away from one another
What do we mean when we say that the universe is expanding?
The Moon is at its closest point in its orbit around the Earth.
What does perigee mean?
a star that always remains above your horizon and appears to rotate around the celestial pole
What is a circumpolar star?
the idea that scientists should prefer the simpler of two models that agree equally well with observations
What is meant by Occam's Razor?
an explanation for a phenomenon that makes a prediction
What is meant by a hypothesis?
a generally well-established scientific theory or set of theories
What is meant by a scientific paradigm?
9.8 meters per second squared
What is the acceleration due to gravity at the Earth's surface
9.8 meters per second squared downward
What is the acceleration of gravity of Earth?
the Sun's apparent path along the celestial sphere
What is the ecliptic?
phases like those of the Moon
When Galileo looked at Venus and Mercury what phenomenon did he see that supported the Coperincan view of the Universe?
hipparcus
Which astronomers created a star catalog which defined a system of stellar brightness.
100 kilometers 100 lightminutes 100 lightyears- correct 12 parsecs
Which distance is the longest?
a region of the celestial sphere
Which of the following best describes the modern definition of a constellation?
a cubic meter of lead
Which of the following has the greatest density
you; Earth; solar system; Milky Way; Local Group; Local Supercluster
Which of the following has your address in the correct order?
The stars twinkle when seen from the surface of planet Earth
Which of the following is NOT a result of the Earth's precession.
driving around in a circle at exactly 100 kilometers per hour
Which of the following is an example in which you are traveling at a constant speed but not at constant velocity?
size of a typical planet
Which of the following is the smallest?
Both the Northern and Southern hemispheres receive the same amount of sunlight on the equinoxes.
Which of the following is true?
Mercury and Venus
Which of the following planets are known as interior planets?
The closer a star is to us the more parallax it exhibits.
Which of the following statements about stellar parallax is true?
The celestial sphere is just another name for our universe.
Which of the following statements about the celestial sphere is NOT true?
It will take me light-years to complete this homework assignment.
Which of the following statements does not use the term light-year in an appropriate way?
hubble
Which of these is NOT a natural satellite?
An object in motion will remain in motion unless a force acts upon it.
Which of these is a law of motion from Newton
Planets are gravitationally bound to the Sun.
Which of these is not one of the laws of planetary motion formulated by Johannes Kepler?
the universe
Which of these is the largest?
time for one revolution
Which of these quantities is not considered when calculating angular momentum?
Your mass changes if you were to stand on another planet with a density different from Earth.
Which of these statements is FALSE?
The force of gravity always points down
Which of these statements is NOT true about the force of gravity?
There are eight planets in our Solar System.
Which of these was not an observation that Galileo Galilei first made with his telescope?
make an observation
Which step of the scientific method must occur first?
the celestial equator and celestial pole being overhead would be different
While standing at the North Pole on the Earth, what will be different about the sky compared to the sky at your home in the continental U.S.?
are a part of the Milky Way galaxy.
While stargazing and pointing out constellations to your friends you explain that all the stars we see
Ptolemy
Who created the best possible geocentric model of the Universe
Tycho Brahe
Who did Kepler work for?
Copernicus
Who proposed the idea that the Sun is at the center of the Solar System?
Galileo
Who was prosecuted twice by the Catholic Church nominally for his astronomical beliefs?
on the northern horizon
You are standing on Earth's equator. Which way is Polaris the North star?
the distance that light travels in one year.
a light year is...
