Transcript Astronomy Basics

Astronomy Basics
An Introduction to Astronomy
2002
Electromagnetic spectrum
The Radiation Out There
Radio image of Jupiter
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Radio: planets, hydrogen
Micro: cosmic background
Infrared: planets, new stars
Visible: fusion
UV: hot stars
X-ray & gamma: bigger than
stars, older than the Sun
X-rays from the accretion disk of a black hole
The Tools of the Trade
Aricebo
Galileo’s Scope
Compton
Gamma Ray
Observatory
Chandra
The Radiation Down Here
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Best Bets: Radio, Visible
Worst View: UV, Micro, Gamma
Most Interference: Radio, Visible, IR
Who, Where and How?
What is a spectrum?
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Spectrum
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Continuous
Emission
Absorption
Composition,
abundance, mass,
rotation, interstellar
dust
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Spectroscopy - an example
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X-ray spectrum
Element composition
Cassiopeia A - SNR
Radio versus X-ray
spectrums
HR diagrams
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Based on
temperature and
luminosity
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Gives us an idea
of the mass
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Mass determines
life-cycle events
Life-cycle events
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Aging
– red giant/planetary
nebula
– supergiant/supernova
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Death
– white dwarf
– neutron star
– black hole
Astronomy at Home
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Start Cheap!
Get familiar with the
Sky
SETI: www.seti.org
– (SETI@home)
Credits
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General information:
– Kaufmann, W. & Comins, N. Discovering the Universe, 4th ed., W.H.
Freeman & Co., NY, 1997.
– Imagine the Universe! A service of the High Energy Astrophysics Science
Archive Research Center (HEASARC) a part of the Laboratory for High
Energy Astrophysics (LHEA) at NASA/GSFC.
http://imagine.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/homepage.html
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Pictures/Images
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Slide 6: Gallery picture from Keck Observatory
Slide 2: Educational graphic from Imagine the Universe!
Slide 3: Harvard's Field Guide to X-ray Astronomy.
Slide 7: Educational graphic from Imagine the Universe!
Credits
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Slides 7-13: Images come from the Astronomy Picture of the Day archive.
Please see the archived picture for further photographic credit.
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Slide 14: Images from Imagine the Universe!, and Molecular Probes.
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Slide 17: Educational graphics from Imagine the Universe!
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Slides 21-22:
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HR diagrams on slides 21-22 come from xxx
The evolution diagrams come from xxx
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Slide 23: The aging/death chart is adapted from a similar chart in Discovering
the Universe by Kaufmann and Comins
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Slide 24: Image is a Hubble Space Telescope gallery picture from STScI.