Zusammenfassung der Ressource
P7 2
- Parralax
- Things appear to move when you are moving
- We can work out the distance to stars that are close with parallax using trigonometry
- We can do this as we know the distance from the earth to the sun
- The bigger the parallax angle the closer the star
- 1 degree = 60 minutes
- 1 minute = 60 seconds
- Closest star is 0.76 seconds parallax angle
- Seconds written as 6"
- Minutes written as 6'
- Parallax doesnt work for stars really far away
- 1 Parsec = distance of object with parallax angle of 1 second
- Distance in parsecs = 1/parallax angle seconds
- Hudgens method
- The further away a star the fainter the light
- Light gets weaker with distance as the photons spread out
- Problems
- 1. Some stars naturally brighter and bigger
- 2. He wasnt taking measurements
- 3. He was assuming all stars are the same
- Luminosity = how bright a star actually is
- Luminosity = energy given out per second as light radiation
- Luminosity depends on how hot and big a star is
- Observed brightness is how bright it appears to be from earth
- Depends on - Stars
luminosity - Distance from
earth - Dust or gas blocking it
- A cepheid is a star that varies in its brightness
- By measuring a cepheids period you can work out the luminosity and the distances very quickly
- Correlation between luminosity and period length in a cepheid
- So people can find out the distances and luminosity of stars with cepheids
- Hubble
- Shapleys argument
- 1. Universe is a gigantic galaxy
- 2. Sun and solar system are far off the center of the universe
- 3. Nebulae are huge clouds of dust and are part of the milky way
- Curtis's argument
- 1. Universe is made up of many galaxies
- 2. Our galaxy is smaller than shapley suggests
- 3. Spiral nebulae are the other distant galaxies completely separate form the milky way
- Hubbles conclusion
- 1. Shapley was right that the solar system is far from the center of the universe
- 2. Curtis was right about the nebulae, they are far away in separate galaxies
- He did this using cepheids to see how far away they are
- 1 mega parsec = 1 million parsecs
- Hubble used the cepheid technique to determine the distances of other galaxies
- By red shift he also found that the galaxies are moving away from us
- A spectrometer is a device that splits light into all the colours produced by the star
- All stars contain hydrogen
- A spectra from stars has black lines because different elements absorb particular wavelengths of light
- The black lines for hydrogen are in every star
- If the black lines are shifted slightly to t he left towards red) then they are moving away
- The further away the galaxies the faster they are moving away from us
- Hubble compared red shift of galaxies and how far away they are and it was basically directly proportional
- Speed of recession = Hubble constant x distance
- km/s = km/s per Mpc x Mpc
- Hubble constant = 70.6 km/s per Mpc
- Understanding stars
- Stars are not all the same colour
- The colour depends on how hot it - the hotter the more white-blue - the colder the more red
- The peak of the graph shows the actual colour and heat of the star
- The more to the left the peak is the hotter the star as it releases radiation at a higher frequency
- The higher the peak the more luminous it is as it releases more radiation
- The frequency is increasing as it gets more to the left (opposite x axis)
- Emitting and absorbing photons
- When you put the light of the sun through a spectrometer there are lots of black Fraunhofer lines
- Some wavelengths are missing
- Burning different elements give different colour flames
- Different elements give out different wavelengths of light when heated - eg sodium gives out two of yellow
- The wavelengths that is emits is called an elements emission spectra
- No two emission spectra are the same
- The emission spectra is the same as the elements absorption spectra
- You can look at the spectra from a star and see which elements are present
- Helium was discovered using this
- Basically when an atom gives out or absorbs light the
electrons are moving up or down energy levels
- When an electron absorbs light it goes up an energy level
- When it emits light it goes down an energy level
- The amount of energy a photon has depends on the difference between energy levels occupied by the electron
- The energy levels are arbituary mathematical values
- Different elements have energy levels in different places
- Different jumps of energy levels mean a different wavelength of light it emitted
- Electrons will only absorb photons with the exact energy to get it up an energy level
- There are as many Fraunhofer lines (black lines) as there are combinations of different energy levels jumps
- How stars and solar systems form
- Scientist believe all stars were formed by clouds of gas slowly being brought together by gravity
- After a long time when the gas starts to get close together it starts spinning
- As it spins around the temperature increases
- As everything collapses the particles spin around faster and it gets hotter
- Eventually, it will get hot enough to fuse hydrogens and then it will be classified as a star
- Over time some of the mass/gas doesn't make it to the star - they are left outside and form planets and mooons
- A protostar is a star that isn't hot enough for fusion
- When it starts fusing hydrogen it is a main sequence star
- Differences between stars is due to their masses