ASTR 1001 Clayton Final Exam
Nightfall: Why are there so many stars visible from their planet compared to Earth?
Their planet is inside a star cluster
Nightfall: Why do the astronomers think there is an unseen Moon orbiting their planet?
There is an unexplained perturbation in the orbit of their planet
Nightfall: What do people see that is frightening when it gets dark?
Thousands of stars
They were formed inside of stars that lived and died before our Solar system formed.
Where did all the chemical elements in our solar system come from?
Eclipses
lunar and solar
Lunar eclipse
the blocking of sunlight to the moon that occurs when Earth is directly between the sun and the moon
What causes the seasons?
the tilt of Earth's axis as it revolves around the sun.
What is electromagnetic waves?
A form of energy that can travel through space.
The Rosetta mission
A mission launched to land on a comet and analyze it -Held a lander module Philae -The Rosetta orbiter was crashed into the comet at the end of the mission in 2016
Moon
A natural satellite orbiting around a planet that is itself presumably orbiting a star.
The cosmic calendar
A scale on which we compress the history of the universe into 1 year
The Scientific Method
A series of steps followed to solve problems including collecting data, formulating a hypothesis, testing the hypothesis, and stating conclusions.
Nightfall: How is the solar system in Nightfall different from ours?
It has 6 suns, one planet and one moon
Gregorian Calendar
Leap year every 4 years, except that only Century years divisible by 400 are Leap Years. (1600 and 2000 were Leap years but 1700, 1800, & 1900 were not) -Off 1 day every 3,300 years.
Solar eclipse
Occurs when the Moon passes directly between the Sun and Earth and casts a shadow over part of Earth
Voyager
One mission was sent out to explore Jupiter and Saturn and the other was sent out to explore Uranus and Neptune, both missions are now exploring interstellar space.
The ancient library at Alexandria
One of the largest and most significant libraries of the ancient world. -Housed 40,000- 400,000 scrolls at any given time -Where some of the first ideas of space observation came from
Nicolaus Copernicus (1473-1543)
Polish astronomer who believed that the Earth orbited the sun.
Galileo Galilei findings
Revolutionized astronomy with the invention of the telescope. -Spotted mountains and valleys on the moon -Discovered that there were spots on the sun -Discovered that Venus went through phases -Discovered the 4 big moons of Jupiter -Found that the Milky Way was made of billions of stars -The church told him to stop writing books and he told he would but continued to write books -The church John Paul II admitted to him being correct in all of his findings
Asteroids
Rocky metallic objects that orbit the sun but are too small to be considered planets
Comet
A ball of frozen dust and rock that orbits the sun and has a tail that glows
True
(T/F) There are multiple stars that are way larger than our Sun
Ancient Astronomy
-Ancient civilizations observed the skies -Many built structures to mark astronomical events
Life of Sir Isaac Newton
-Born in England -His father died before he was born and his mother moved away when he was three -Was raised by his uncle -Developed and proved his theory that white light is composed of a mixture of other colors of light -developed a binomial theorem -Came up with the concept of the attraction between bodies in space that holds everything in orbit -Discovered the three laws of motion
The life of Kepler
-Born in Germany in 1571 -Born into a poor family but received a scholarship to the University of Tubingen -Began to work under Tychno Brahe after moving to Prague due to a reformation -Used Tychno's findings to further observe the planetary system -Discovered the three laws of planetary motion
Life of Galileo
-Born in Italy -Made contributions to sciences of motion, astronomy, and strength of materials -His discoveries on intertia, the law of falling bodies, and parabolic trajectories marked the beginning of a change in the study of motion -Revolutionized astronomy with his discovery of the telescope -Was was told to stop writing his books by the church but did not stop -Once the church found out he had continued he was placed on house arrest for the rest of his life
What would ancient man have known about the seasons?
-Different constellations during different seasons -There will never be a 'new' constellation in the sky
Jovian planets
-Made of gas -Huge -Further from the sun -Have lots of moons (Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune)
Terrestrial planets
-Rocky -Small, -Close to the sun -Not as many moons (Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars)
Calendars
-The Roman calendar was off by 80 days -Julius Caesar ordered a new calendar called the "Julian" calendar (A year was 365 1/4 days long, came up with a leap year) -Pope Gregory ordered that a new calendar be devised in 1582
How do the Sun, Moon, and planets move through the sky throughout the year?
-The sun moves along the ecliptic -The planets and moon closely follow the ecliptic.
Eratosthenes
-calculated the circumference of the earth -proved the earth was round
Kepler's Laws of Planetary Motion
1.) the planets move in elliptical orbits with the Sun at one focus 2.)the time necessary to traverse any arc of a planetary orbit is proportional to the area of the sector between the central body and that arc 3.) There is an exact relationship between the squares of the planets' periodic times and the cubes of the radii of their orbits
How much shorter is an actual year compared to a Julian year?
11 mins and 14.8 seconds which matters because it will start to add up over the years.
Johannes Kepler (1571-1630)
After Tychos death he used his information to come up with his three laws as to how the orbits actually happen in the solar system. -Proved that the Earth goes around the sun in an elliptic
Nightfall: What happens every 2,500 years?
All the Suns are below the horizon except for one which is eclipsed by the moon
Newton's 1st Law of Motion
An object at rest remains at rest, and an object in motion remains in motion at constant speed and in a straight line unless acted on by an unbalanced force.
How do the stars rise and set at different latitudes? -Baton Rouge -Equator -South Pole
Baton Rouge: Cannot see the stars near the South Pole and the stars near the North Pole never set Equator: All of the stars will appear to rise and set at the equator South Pole: No stars set or rise at the South Pole but you only see half of the celestial sphere. Stars rotate clockwise around the South Celestial pole.
Rotation of the Moon
Rotates Earth once every 27 days and it takes about 27 days to rotate on its axis
What do we need to measure in space? How do we measure it?
Distance, velocity, mass, size, density, composition, temperature; most distances in space are measured by light years through telescopes while mass and density are found by using newtons 2nd law of motion.
Motions of the stars
East to West
Relativity theory
Einstein's theory that holds, among other things, that (1) space and time are not absolute but are relative to the observer and interwoven into a four-dimensional space-time continuum and (2) matter is a form of energy (E = mc2).
The suns shadows
Eratosthenes calculated the size of the Earth by observing what?
What is the difference between a fact and a theory?
Facts are observations whereas theories are the explanations to those observations -Theories are vague truths or unclear facts
Newton's Third Law of Motion
For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction
Who was the first scientist?
Galileo
-A star exploded -All of the elements from the star began getting pulled together by gravity to form the planets -The Sun then also exploded and blew all of the nebula dust out through the solar system which helped finishing forming the planets.
How did the Solar system form?
1 AU (93 million miles)
How far is Earth from the Sun?
5.203 AU (483.6 Million miles)
How far is Jupiter from the Sun?
.39 AU (36 Million miles)
How far is Mercury from the Sun?
30.06 AU (2,794 Million miles)
How far is Neptune from the Sun?
39.53 AU (3,674.5 Million miles)
How far is Pluto from the Sun?
9.539 AU (886.7 Million miles)
How far is Saturn from the Sun?
19.18 AU (1,784 Million miles)
How far is Uranus from the Sun?
.723 AU (67.2 Million miles)
How far is Venus from the Sun?
1.524 AU (141.6 Million Miles)
How far us Mars from the Sun?
Drought
How have climatologists explained the collapse of the Harrapan culture of India? a. Earthquakes b. Volcanoes c. Floods d. Drought e. A Tsunami
It was formed after the Earth collided with another planet.
How is our moon thought to have formed?
Cores drilled a mile down into the ice reveal 100,000 years of Earth's climate history
How is the Antarctic ice sheet providing evidence of climate change? a. Tiny microbes live under the rocks b. Penguins have evolved to survive the cold c. Glaciers are moving toward the ocean d. Cores drilled a mile down into the ice reveal 100,000 years of Earth's climate history e. There are volcanoes under the ice
4.5 Billion years
How many years ago was Earth thought to have formed?
Tycho Brahe (1546-1601)
Spent decades observing the stars and planets (Particularly Mars) with various tools but without a telescope. -Tracked the retrograde motion of mars before retrograde motion had been discovered
Copernicus, Tycho, Kepler, & Galileo
The Big 4
What is the path called that the sun takes across the sky throughout the year?
The Ecliptic
Newton's Second Law of Motion
The acceleration of an object depends on the mass of the object and the amount of force applied.
Retrograde Motion
The apparent motion of the planets when they appear to move backwards (westward) with respect to the stars from the direction that they move ordinarily.
Moon phases
The changing appearances of the Moon as seen from Earth
significant digits
The digits in a decimal number that carry meaning contributing to the precision or accuracy of the quantity.
Time of day
The earth takes 23 hours and 56 minutes to complete a full revolution but we have a 24 hour day because the Earths orbit around the sun and it takes about 4 more minutes for the sun to get in the same position every day.
23 hours and 56 minutes
The length of a full day on Earth is ____.
The Ecliptic
The path of the sun and the planets
Anasazi astronomy
The people built a temple that was able to predict the changes of the seasons
(True/False) A lunar eclipse can only happen during a full moon. Why?
True because only at the Full Moon can the Sun, Earth, and Moon be lined up with the Earth between the moon and the sun
-It must orbit a star -It must be big enough to have enough gravity to force it into a spherical shape -It must be big enough that its gravity cleared away any other objects of a similar size near its orbit around the Sun.
What are the defining characteristics of planets?
Every planet in our solar system with about 2,700 miles to spare
What can you fit in between the Earth and the moon? (Happy video)
Flattened and grooved bedrock and rocks found hundreds of miles from where they should be
What evidence did geologist Louis Agassiz use to support his theory of glaciation? a. Stalactites and stalagmites in caves b. Tiny microbes in Antarctica c. Flattened and grooved bedrock and rocks found hundreds of miles from where they should be d. Cores of ocean sediments e. The Arctic used to be tropical with jungles.
Impact craters
What feature does not require a planet to have any particular characteristics? A) Dunes B) Impact craters C) Stream beds D) Volcanic lava flows
Volcanic lava flows
What feature requires a planet to have a hot, molten interior?
Steam beds
What feature requires a planet to have a liquid on the surface?
Dunes and Steam beds
What feature requires a planet to have an atmosphere?
This year, Greenlands massive glaciers have been melting at an alarming rate due to the warming of the ocean surrounding these glaciers
What has NASA found while tracking the glaciers around Greenland?
The sea ice this year has melted during this past summer faster than it usually does in the past years
What is going on with the arctic ice melting?
-The Sun -The Planets -Comets -Satellites -Meteoroids
What is in the Solar System?
4,000 Miles (5th largest planet)
What is the size of Earth?
43,000 Miles (Largest planet)
What is the size of Jupiter?
2,500 Miles (7th largest planet)
What is the size of Mars?
1,500 Miles (8th largest planet)
What is the size of Mercury?
15,000 Miles (4th largest planet)
What is the size of Neptune?
36,000 Miles (2nd largest planet)
What is the size of Saturn?
16,000 Miles (3rd largest planet)
What is the size of Uranus?
3,700 Miles (6th largest planet)
What is the size of Venus?
432,000 Miles
What is the size of the sun?
Earths CO2 levels have been increasing at about 2.5 ppm
What is the trend of Earths CO2 levels?
Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Pluto, Venus, Mars, Mercury,
What planets have been flown by?
Jupiter, Saturn, Mercury
What planets have been orbited?
Jupiter, Venus, and Mars
What planets have we landed on?
What is a theory?
a supposition or a system of ideas intended to explain something, especially one based on general principles independent of the thing to be explained.
Evolution Theory
all species of organisms arise and develop through the natural selection of small, inherited variations that increase the individual's ability to compete, survive, and reproduce.
What is light?
an electromagnetic wave
What is a wavelength?
distance between crests