Chapter 1

History of Astronomy

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Periods of Western Astronomy
• Western astronomy divides into 4 periods
– Prehistoric (before 500 B.C.)
• Cyclical motions of Sun, Moon and stars observed
• Keeping time and determining directions develops
– Classical (500 B.C. to A.D. 1400)
• Measurements of the heavens
• Geometry and models to explain motions
– Renaissance (1400 to 1650)
• Accumulation of data led to better models
• Technology (the telescope) enters picture
– Modern (1650 to present)
• Physical laws and mathematical techniques
• Technological advances accelerate
 Prehistoric Astronomy
• The heavens have been
studied for thousands of
years.
• Early astronomers noted
the obvious:
– Rising of the Sun in the
eastern sky and its setting
in the west
– Changing appearance of
the Moon
– Eclipses
– Planets as a distinct class
of objects different from
the stars
 Prehistoric Astronomy
– Many astronomical phenomena are cyclic on a
day-to-day and year-to-year basis and
consequently gave prehistoric people:
• Methods for time keeping
• Ability to predict and plan future events
• Incentive to build monumental structures such as
Stonehenge
– Modern civilization no longer relies on direct
astronomical observations for time keeping and
planning
– Studying the night sky provides link to past
Stonehenge
The Celestial Sphere
• Vast distances to stars
prevent us from
sensing their true 3-D
arrangement
• Naked eye
observations treat all
stars at the same
distance, on a giant
celestial sphere with
the Earth at its center
 Models and Science
• The celestial sphere
is a model, which
does not
necessarily match
physical reality
• Models provide a
means to enhance
our understanding
of nature
 Constellations

• Constellations are fixed arrangements of stars that resemble

animals, objects, and mythological figures
• Stars in a constellation are not physically related
 Constellations

• Positions of stars change very • Origin of the ancient

slowly; constellations will constellations is unknown
although they probably served
look the same for thousands
as mnemonic tools for tracking
of years seasons and navigation
 Diurnal vs. Annular Motion
• Diurnal Motion • Annual Motion
– “Daily Motion” – “Yearly Motion”
– Sun, Moon, planets, – Due to the Earth’s
and stars rise in the revolution
east and set in the west
– Due to the Earth’s
– Is the sky different
rotation
from day to day?
– Month to month?
– Ancient astronomers
– Year to year?
took all celestial
motion to be diurnal
– The Celestial Sphere!
 Diurnal Motion
• Daily motion can be
explained by the rotation
of the celestial sphere
about the north and south
celestial poles located
directly above the Earth’s
north and south poles
• The celestial equator,
which lies directly above
the Earth’s equator,
provides another
astronomical reference
marker
 Annual Motion

• For a given time (say 10:00 PM), as the months proceed,

constellations do not appear in the same part of the sky
 Annual Motion
• A given star rises 3
minutes 56 seconds
earlier each night
• This annual motion is
caused by the Earth’s
motion around the Sun,
the result of projection
• The ancients used the
periodic annual motion
to mark the seasons
The Ecliptic
• The path of the Sun
through the stars on
the celestial sphere is
called the ecliptic
• The ecliptic is a
projection of the
Earth’s orbit onto the
celestial sphere and is
tipped relative to the
celestial equator
 The Seasons

• The Earth is closest to the Sun in January, which is

winter in the northern hemisphere
• Therefore, the seasons cannot be caused by the
Sun’s proximity to the Earth
• The Earth’s rotation axis is tilted 23.5º from a line
perpendicular to the Earth’s orbital plane
 The Seasons

• The rotation axis of the Earth maintains nearly the same tilt
and direction from year to year
• The northern and southern hemispheres alternate receiving
(on a yearly cycle) the majority of direct light from the Sun
• This leads to the seasons!
The Seasons
 Seasons and The Ecliptic
• The tilt of the Earth’s rotation axis causes
the ecliptic not to be aligned with the
celestial equator
• Sun is above celestial equator in June when
the Northern Hemisphere is tipped toward
the Sun, and is below the equator in
December when tipped away
• Tilting explains seasonal altitude of Sun at
noon, highest in summer and lowest in
winter
The Ecliptic’s Tilt
 Solstices and Equinoxes
• Points on horizon where Sun rises and sets changes periodically
throughout year
• In summer months of Northern hemisphere, the Sun rises north
of east and sets north of west
• In winter months of Northern hemisphere, the Sun rises south of
east and sets south of west
• The solstices (about June 21 and December 21) are when the
Sun rises at the most extreme north and south points
• The equinoxes (equal day and night and about March 21 and
September 23) are when the Sun rises directly east
• Ancients marked position of Sun rising and setting to determine
the seasons (e.g., Stonehenge)
Solstices and Equinoxes
 Planets and the Zodiac

• The planets (Greek for • Motion and location of the

“wanderers”) do not follow planets in the sky is a
the same cyclic behavior of combination of all the planets’
the stars
orbits being nearly in the
• The planets move relative to same plane and their relative
the stars in a very narrow speeds about the Sun
band centered about the
ecliptic and called the zodiac
 Planets and the Zodiac

• Apparent motion
of planets is
usually from west
to east relative to
the stars, although
on a daily basis,
the planets always
rise in the east
 Retrograde Motion

• Occasionally, a planet will move from east to west relative to the

stars; this is called retrograde motion
• Explaining retrograde motion was one of the main reasons
astronomers ultimately rejected the idea of the Earth being
located at the center of the solar system
 The Moon
• Rises in the east and
sets in the west
• Like the planets and
Sun, the Moon
moves from west to
east relative to the
stars (roughly the
width of the Moon in
one hour)
The Phases of the Moon
• During a period of
about 30 days, the
Moon goes through a
complete set of
phases: new, waxing
crescent, first quarter,
waxing gibbous, full,
waning gibbous, third
quarter, waning
crescent
 The Phases of the Moon

– The phase cycle is the origin of the month (derived

from the word moon) as a time period
– The phases of the Moon are caused by the relative
positions of the Sun, Earth, and Moon
 Lunar Rise and Set Times

• The Moon
rises roughly
50 minutes
later each day
 Eclipses

• An eclipse occurs when the Sun, Earth, and Moon

are directly in line with each other
• A solar eclipse occurs when the Moon passes
between the Sun and Earth, with the Moon casting
its shadow on the Earth causing a midday sky to
become dark as night for a few minutes
Solar Eclipse from Space
 Lunar Eclipses

• A lunar eclipse occurs when the Earth passes

between the Sun and Moon, with the Earth
casting its shadow on the Moon giving it a dull
red color
 Eclipse Periods

• Eclipses do not occur every 30 days since the

Moon’s orbit is tipped relative to the Earth’s
orbit
• The tipped orbit allows the shadow of the
Earth (Moon) to miss the Moon (Earth)
 Ancient Greek Astronomers
• Through the use of models and
observations, they were the first to use a
careful and systematic manner to explain
the workings of the heavens
• Limited to naked-eye observations, their
idea of using logic and mathematics as tools
for investigating nature is still with us today
• Their investigative methodology is in many
ways as important as the discoveries
themselves
 Early Ideas: Pythagoras

• Pythagoras taught as
early as 500 B.C. that
the Earth was round,
based on the belief
that the sphere is the
perfect shape used
by the gods
Early Ideas: Aristotle
• By 300 B.C., Aristotle
presented naked-eye
observations for the
Earth’s spherical
shape:
– Shape of Earth’s
shadow on the Moon
during an eclipse
Early Ideas: Aristotle

– He also noted
that a traveler
moving south
will see stars
previously
hidden by the
southern horizon
 Early Ideas: The Size of the Earth
(ĕrətŏs'thənēz)
• Eratosthenes (276-
195 B.C.) made the
first measurement
of the Earth’s size
• He obtained a value
of 25,000 miles for
the circumference,
a value very close
to today’s value
 Early Ideas: The Size of the Earth
• He measured the
shadow length of a
stick set vertically in
the ground in the town
of Alexandria on the
summer solstice at
noon, converting the
shadow length to an
angle of solar light
incidence, and using the
distance to Syene, a
town where no shadow
is cast at noon on the
summer solstice
 Early Ideas: Distance and Size of
the Sun and Moon
• The sizes and distances
of the Sun and Moon
relative to Earth were
determined by
Aristarchus about 75
years before
Eratosthenes measured
the Earth’s size
• Once the actual size of
the Earth was
determined, the absolute
sizes and distances of
the Sun and Moon
could be determined
 Early Ideas: Distance and Size of
the Sun and Moon

• These relative sizes were based on the angular size of

objects and a simple geometry formula relating the
object’s diameter, its angular size, and its distance
 Early Ideas: Distance and Size of
the Sun and Moon

• Aristarchus, realizing the Sun was very large,

proposed the Sun as center of the Solar System, but the
lack of parallax argued against such a model
 Early Ideas: The Geocentric
Model
• Because of the general east to west motion of objects
in the sky, geocentric theories were developed to
explain the motions
• Eudoxus (400-347 B.C.) proposed a geocentric model
in which each celestial object was mounted on its own
revolving transparent sphere with its own separate tilt
• The faster an object moved in the sky, the smaller was
its corresponding sphere
• This simple geocentric model could not explain
retrograde motion without appealing to clumsy and
unappealing contrivances
Early Ideas: The Geocentric
Model
 Ptolemy of Alexandria
• Ptolemy of Alexandria
improved the geocentric
model by assuming each
planet moved on a small
circle, which in turn had
its center move on a
much larger circle
centered on the Earth
• The small circles were
called epicycles and
were incorporated so as
to explain retrograde
motion
 Ptolemy of Alexandria
• Ptolemy’s model was able to
predict planetary motion with
fair precision
• Discrepancies remained and
this led to the development of
very complex Ptolemaic
models up until about the
1500s
• Ultimately, all the geocentric
models collapsed under the
weight of “Occam’s razor”
and the heliocentric models
prevailed
 Non-Western Contributions
• Islamic Contributions
– Relied on celestial phenomena to set its religious calendar
– Created a large vocabulary still evident today (e.g., zenith,
Betelgeuse)
– Developed algebra and Arabic numerals
• Asian Contributions
– Devised constellations based on Asian mythologies
– Kept detailed records of unusual celestial events (e.g.,
eclipses, comets, supernova, and sunspots)
– Eclipse predictions
 Astronomy in the Renaissance
• Nicolaus Copernicus
(1473-1543)
– Could not reconcile
centuries of data with
Ptolemy’s geocentric
model
– Consequently, Copernicus
reconsidered Aristarchus’s
heliocentric model with the
Sun at the center of the
solar system
 Astronomy in the Renaissance
• Heliocentric models
explain retrograde motion
as a natural consequence
of two planets (one being
the Earth) passing each
other
• Copernicus could also
derive the relative
distances of the planets
from the Sun
Astronomy in the Renaissance
• However, problems
remained:
– Could not predict planet
positions any more
accurately than the model
of Ptolemy
– Could not explain lack of
parallax motion of stars
– Conflicted with
Aristotelian “common
sense”
Astronomy in the Renaissance

• Tycho Brahe (1546-

1601)
– Designed and built
instruments of far
greater accuracy than
any yet devised
– Made meticulous
measurements of the
planets
 Astronomy in the Renaissance
• Tycho Brahe (1546-1601)
– Made observations
(supernova and comet) that
suggested that the heavens
were both changeable and
more complex than
previously believed
– Proposed compromise
geocentric model, as he
observed no parallax
motion!
 Astronomy in the Renaissance
• Johannes Kepler
(1571-1630)
– Upon Tycho’s death,
his data passed to
Kepler, his young
assistant
– Using the very precise
Mars data, Kepler
showed the orbit to be
an ellipse
 Kepler’s 1 Lawst

• Planets move in
elliptical orbits with
the Sun at one focus
of the ellipse
 Kepler’s 2nd Law
• The orbital speed of a
planet varies so that a
line joining the Sun
and the planet will
sweep out equal areas
in equal time intervals
• The closer a planet is
to the Sun, the faster
it moves
 Kepler’s 3rd Law
• The amount of time a
planet takes to orbit
the Sun is related to
its orbit’s size
• The square of the
period, P, is
proportional to the
cube of the semimajor
axis, a
 Kepler’s 3rd Law
• This law implies that
a planet with a larger
average distance from
the Sun, which is the
semimajor axis
distance, will take
longer to circle the
Sun
• Third law hints at the
nature of the force
holding the planets in
orbit
 Kepler’s 3rd Law
• Third law can be
used to determine
the semimajor axis,
a, if the period, P,
is known, a
measurement that
is not difficult to
make
 Astronomy in the Renaissance
• Galileo (1564-1642)
– Contemporary of Kepler
– First person to use the
telescope to study the
heavens and offer
interpretations
• The Moon’s surface has
features similar to that of
the Earth  The Moon is a
ball of rock
 Astronomy in the Renaissance
– The Sun has spots  The Sun
is not perfect, changes its
appearance, and rotates
– Jupiter has four objects
orbiting it  The objects are
moons and they are not
circling Earth
– Milky Way is populated by
uncountable number of stars
 Earth-centered universe is
too simple
Evidence for the Heliocentric Model

• Venus undergoes full phase cycle  Venus must

circle Sun
 Astronomy in the Renaissance
• Credited with originating the
experimental method for
studying scientific problems
• Deduced the first correct
“laws of motion”
• Was brought before the
Inquisition and put under
house arrest for the
remainder of his life
 Isaac Newton
• Isaac Newton (1642-
1727) was born the
year Galileo died
• He made major
advances in
mathematics,
physics, and
astronomy
 Isaac Newton
• He pioneered the modern
studies of motion, optics,
and gravity and
discovered the
mathematical methods of
calculus
• It was not until the 20th
century that Newton’s
laws of motion and
gravity were modified by
the theories of relativity
 The Growth of Astrophysics
• New Discoveries
– In 1781, Sir William Herschel discovered Uranus;
he also discovered that stars can have companions
– Irregularities in Uranus’s orbit together with law of
gravity led to discovery of Neptune
• New Technologies
– Improved optics led to bigger telescopes and the
discovery of nebulas and galaxies
– Photography allowed the detection of very faint
objects
 The Growth of Astrophysics

• The Nature of Matter and Heat

– The ancient Greeks introduced the idea of the atom
(Greek for “uncuttable”), which today has been
modified to include a nucleus and a surrounding
cloud of electrons
– Heating (transfer of energy) and the motion of
atoms was an important topic in the 1700s and
1800s
 The Growth of Astrophysics
• The Kelvin Temperature Scale
– An object’s temperature is directly related to its
energy content and to the speed of molecular
motion
– As a body is cooled to zero Kelvin, molecular
motion within it slows to a virtual halt and its
energy approaches zero  no negative temperatures
– Fahrenheit and Celsius are two other temperature
scales that are easily converted to Kelvin
The Kelvin Temperature Scale
 Chapter 2

Gravity and Motion

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 Gravity
• Gravity gives the
Universe its structure
– It is a universal force that
causes all objects to pull on
all other objects
everywhere
– It holds objects together
– It is responsible for holding
the Earth in its orbit around
the Sun, the Sun in its orbit
around the Milky Way, and
the Milky Way in its path
within the Local Group
The Problem of Astronomical
Motion
• Astronomers of antiquity did
not connect gravity and
astronomical motion
• Galileo investigated this
connection with experiments
using projectiles and balls
rolling down planks
• He put science on a course to
determine laws of motion and
to develop the scientific
method
 Inertia
• Galileo established the idea of inertia
– A body at rest tends to remain at rest
– A body in motion tends to remain in motion
– Through experiments with inclined planes,
Galileo demonstrated the idea of inertia and the
importance of forces (friction)
 Inertia and Newton’s First Law

• This concept was

incorporated in
Newton’s First Law
of Motion:

A body continues in a
state of rest or uniform
motion in a straight
line unless made to
change that state by
forces acting on it
 Newton’s First Law

• Important ideas of
Newton’s First Law – The law implies that if
– Force: A push or a pull an object is not moving
with constant velocity,
– The force referred to is a
then a nonzero net
net force
force must be present
 Astronomical Motion

• As seen in Chapter 1, • Must there be a force at

planets move along work? Eqn. of ellipse
curved (elliptical) paths, • Yes!
or orbits.
• Speed and direction is
changing
Gravity is that force!
 Orbital Motion and Gravity
• Although not the first to propose gravity as being
responsible for celestial motion, Newton was the first
to:
– Spell out the properties of gravity
– Write the equations of gravity-induced motion
• Newton deduced that:
– The Moon’s motion could be explained by the existence of a
force (to deviate the Moon from a straight inertial trajectory)
and that such a force decreased with distance
– Orbital motion could be understood as a projectile moving
“parallel” to the Earth’s surface at such a speed that its
gravitational deflection toward the surface is offset by the
surface’s curvature away from the projectile
 Orbital Motion Using Newton’s
First Law

• A cannonball fired at • A cannonball fired at a

slow speed experiences higher speed feels the
one force – gravity, same force, but goes
pulling it downward farther
 Orbital Motion Using Newton’s
First Law
• At a sufficiently high
speed, the cannonball
travels so far that the
ground curves out from
under it.
• The cannonball literally
misses the ground!
• The ball, now in orbit,
still experiences the pull
of gravity!
 Newton’s Second Law: Motion
• Motion
– An object is said to be in
uniform motion if its
speed and direction
remain unchanged
– An object in uniform
motion is said to have a
constant velocity
– A force will cause an
object to have non-
uniform motion, a
changing velocity
– Acceleration is defined
as a change in velocity
 Newton’s 2nd Law: Acceleration

• Acceleration
– An object increasing or – Acceleration is produced
decreasing in speed along a by a force and experiments
straight line is accelerating
show the two are
– An object with constant speed
proportional
moving is a circle is
accelerating
 Newton’s Second Law: Mass
• Mass
– Mass is the amount of matter
an object contains
– Technically, mass is a
measure of an object’s inertia
– Mass is generally measured
in kilograms
– Mass should not be confused
with weight, which is a force
related to gravity – weight
may change from place to
place, but mass does not
Newton’s Second Law of Motion

F = ma
• Equivalently, the amount of acceleration (a)
that an object undergoes is proportional to
the force applied (F) and inversely
proportional to the mass (m) of the object
– This equation applies for any force,
gravitational or otherwise
F = ma
Newton’s Law of Universal Gravity

• Everything attracts everything else!!

 Newton’s Third Law of Motion
• When two objects
interact, they create
equal and opposite
forces on each
other
• This is true for any
two objects,
including the Sun
and the Earth!
 Measuring an Object’s Mass
Using Orbital Motion
• Basic Setup of an Orbital Motion Problem
– Assume a small mass object orbits around a much more massive
object
– Massive object can be assumed at rest (very little acceleration)
– Assume orbit shape of small mass is a circle centered on large
mass
• Using Newton’s Second Law
– Acceleration in a circular orbit must be:
a = v2/r
where v is the constant orbital speed and r is the radius of the orbit
– The force is that of gravity
Measuring an Object’s Mass Using Orbital Motion
• Method of Solution
– Equate F = mv2/r to F = GMm/r2 and solve for v:
v = (GM/r)1/2
– One can also solve for M:
M = (v2r)/G
– v can be expressed in terms of the orbital period (P) on the
small mass and its orbital radius:
v = 2r/P
– Combining these last two equations:
M = (42r3)/(GP2)
– This last equation in known as Kepler’s modified third law and
is often used to calculate the mass of a large celestial object
from the orbital period and radius of a much smaller mass
 Surface Gravity

• Surface gravity is the acceleration a mass

undergoes at the surface of a celestial object (e.g.,
an asteroid, planet, or star)
• Surface gravity:
– Determines the weight of a mass at a celestial object’s
surface
– Influences the shape of celestial objects
– Influences whether or not a celestial object has an
atmosphere
 Surface Gravity Calculations
• Surface gravity is determined from Newton’s Second
Law and the Law of Gravity:
ma = GMm/R2
where M and R are the mass and radius of the celestial
object, and m is the mass of the object whose acceleration
a we wish to know
• The surface gravity, denoted by g, is then:
g = GM/R2
• Notice dependence of g on M and R, but not m
• gEarth = 9.8 m/s2
• gEarth/gMoon = 5.6 and gJupiter/gEarth = 3
 Escape Velocity

• To overcome a celestial object’s gravitational

force and escape into space, a mass must obtain a
critical speed called the escape velocity
• Escape velocity:
– Determines if a spacecraft can move from one planet to
another
– Influences whether or not a celestial object has an
atmosphere
– Relates to the nature of black holes
Escape Velocity
 Escape Velocity Calculation

• The escape velocity, Vesc, is determined from

Newton’s laws of motion and the Law of Gravity
and is given by:
Vesc = (2GM/R)1/2
where M and R are the mass and radius of the celestial
object from which the mass wishes to escape
• Notice dependence of Vesc on M and R, but not m
• Vesc,Earth = 11 km/s, Vesc,Moon = 2.4 km/s
Escape Velocity
 Chapter 4
Light and Atoms

Copyright (c) The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. Permission required for reproduction or display.
 Light and Atoms - Starlight
READ pages 89 – 96, 98 – 99, 102 – 103, 106
– 108, and 110
Our home planet is separated from other
astronomical bodies by vast differences such that
we can not learn from them by direct
measurements. “Starlight” is the messenger!

Test Yourself: 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 8
 Light – the Astronomer’s Tool
• Due to the vast distances, with few exceptions,
direct measurements of astronomical bodies are
not possible
• We study remote bodies indirectly by analyzing
their light
• Understanding the properties of light is therefore
essential
• Care must be given to distinguish light signatures
that belong to the distant body from signatures
that do not (e.g., our atmosphere may distort
distant light signals)
 Properties of Light
– Light is radiant energy: it does not require a medium
for travel (unlike sound!)
– Light travels at 299,792.458 km/s in a vacuum (fast
enough to circle the Earth 7.5 times in one second)
– Speed of light in a vacuum is constant and is denoted
by the letter “c”
– However, the speed of light is reduced as it passes
through transparent materials
• The speed of light in transparent materials is dependent on
color
• Fundamental reason telescopes work the way they do!
 Sometimes light can be described as a
wave…

– The wave travels as a result of a fundamental

relationship between electricity and magnetism
– A changing magnetic field creates an electric field
and a changing electric field creates a magnetic field
…and sometimes it can be described
as a particle!

– Light thought of as a stream of particles called

photons
– Each photon particle carries energy, depending
on its frequency or wavelength
 So which model do we use?

– Well, it depends!
• In a vacuum, photons travel in straight lines, but
behave like waves
• Sub-atomic particles also act as waves
• Wave-particle duality: All particles of nature
behave as both a wave and a particle
• Which property of light manifests itself depends
on the situation
• We concentrate on the wave picture henceforth
 Light and Color

• Colors to which the human – The nanometer (10-9 m)

eye is sensitive is referred to is the convenient unit
as the visible spectrum
– Red = 700 nm (longest
• In the wave theory, color is
determined by the light’s visible wavelength),
wavelength (symbolized as violet = 400 nm (shortest
) visible wavelength)
The Visible Spectrum
 Frequency
• Sometimes it is more convenient to talk
about light’s frequency
– Frequency (or ) is the number of wave crests
that pass a given point in 1 second (measured in
Hertz, Hz)
– Important relation:  = c
– Long wavelenth = low frequency
– Short wavelength = high frequency
 White light – a mixture of all colors

• A prism demonstrates
that white light is a
• Additionally, one can
mixture of
recombine a spectrum
wavelengths by its
of colors and obtain
creation of a spectrum
white light
 The Electromagnetic Spectrum

• The electromagnetic spectrum is composed

of radio waves, microwaves, infrared,
visible light, ultraviolet, x rays, and gamma
rays
• Longest wavelengths are more than 10 3 km
• Shortest wavelengths are less than 10 -18 m
• Various instruments used to explore the
various regions of the spectrum
 Infrared Radiation
• Sir William
Herschel (around
1800) showed
heat radiation
related to visible
light • Our skin feels
• He measured an infrared as heat
elevated
temperature just
off the red end of
a solar spectrum –
infrared energy
Ultraviolet Light

• J. Ritter in 1801
noticed silver chloride
blackened when
exposed to “light” just
beyond the violet end
of the visible spectrum
• Mostly absorbed by
the atmosphere
• Responsible for
suntans (and burns!)
 Radio Waves
• Predicted by Maxwell in mid-
1800s, Hertz produced radio waves
in 1888
• Jansky discovered radio waves
from cosmic sources in the 1930s,
the birth of radio astronomy
• Radio waves used to study a wide
range of astronomical processes
• Radio waves also used for
communication, microwave ovens,
and search for extraterrestrials
 X-Rays
– Roentgen discovered X rays in
1895
– First detected beyond the Earth in
the Sun in late 1940s
– Used by doctors to scan bones
and organs
– Used by astronomers to detect
black holes and tenuous gas in
distant galaxies
 Gamma Rays
• Gamma Ray region of the
spectrum still relatively
unexplored
• Atmosphere absorbs this region,
so all observations must be done
from orbit!
• We sometimes see bursts of
gamma ray radiation from deep
space
 Energy Carried by
Electromagnetic Radiation
– Each photon of wavelength  carries an energy E
given by:
E = hc/
where h is Planck’s constant
– Notice that a photon of short wavelength radiation
carries more energy than a long wavelength photon

– Short wavelength = high frequency = high energy

– Long wavelength = low frequency = low energy
 Matter and Heat

• The Nature of Matter and Heat

– The ancient Greeks introduced the idea of the atom
(Greek for “uncuttable”), which today has been
modified to include a nucleus and a surrounding
cloud of electrons
– Heating (transfer of energy) and the motion of
atoms was an important topic in the 1700s and
1800s
 A New View of Temperature
• The Kelvin Temperature Scale
– An object’s temperature is directly related to its
energy content and to the speed of molecular
motion
– As a body is cooled to zero Kelvin, molecular
motion within it slows to a virtual halt and its
energy approaches zero  no negative temperatures
– Fahrenheit and Celsius are two other temperature
scales that are easily converted to Kelvin
The Kelvin Temperature Scale
 Radiation and Temperature
• Heated bodies generally
radiate across the entire
electromagnetic spectrum
• There is one particular
wavelength, m, at which
the radiation is most
intense and is given by
Wien’s Law:
m = k/T

Where k is some constant

and T is the temperature
of the body
Radiation and Temperature
– Note hotter bodies radiate
more strongly at shorter
wavelengths
– As an object heats, it
appears to change color
from red to white to blue
– Measuring m gives a
body’s temperature
– Careful: Reflected light
does not give the
temperature
 Blackbodies and Wien’s Law
– A blackbody is an object that absorbs all the radiation falling
on it
– Since such an object does not reflect any light, it appears
black when cold, hence its name
– As a blackbody is heated, it radiates more efficiently than any
other kind of object
– Blackbodies are excellent absorbers and emitters of radiation
and follow Wien’s law
– Very few real objects are perfect blackbodies, but many
objects (e.g., the Sun and Earth) are close approximations
– Gases, unless highly compressed, are not blackbodies and can
only radiate in narrow wavelength ranges
Blackbodies and Wien’s Law
 The Structure of Atoms
• Nucleus – Composed of
densely packed neutrons
and positively charged
protons
• Cloud of negative
electrons held in orbit
around nucleus by
positive charge of
protons
• Typical atom size: 10-10
m (= 1 Å = 0.1 nm)
 The Chemical Elements
• An element is a substance
composed only of atoms
that have the same number
of protons in their nucleus
• A neutral element will
contain an equal number
of protons and electrons
• The chemical properties of
an element are determined
by the number of electrons
 Electron “Orbits”

• The electron orbits are

quantized, can only have
discrete values and nothing in
between
• As electrons move from
• Quantized orbits are the one orbit to another, they
result of the wave-particle change their energy in
duality of matter discrete amounts
 Energy Change in an Atom

• An atom’s energy
is increased if an
electron moves to
an outer orbit – the
atom is said to be
excited
• An atom’s energy
is decreased if an
electron moves to
an inner orbit
 Conservation of Energy
• The energy change of an atom must be
compensated elsewhere – Conservation of
Energy
• Absorption and emission of EM radiation are
two ways to preserve energy conservation
• In the photon picture, a photon is absorbed as
an electron moves to a higher orbit and a
photon is emitted as an electron moves to a
lower orbit
Emission
Absorption
 Spectroscopy

• Allows the determination of

the composition and conditions • Spectroscopy assumes that
of an astronomical body every atom or molecule
• In spectroscopy, we capture will have a unique spectral
and analyze a spectrum signature
 Formation of a Spectrum

• A transition in energy level produces a photon

 Types of Spectra
– Continuous spectrum
• Spectra of a blackbody
• Typical objects are solids and dense gases
– Emission-line spectrum
• Produced by hot, tenuous gases
• Fluorescent tubes, aurora, and many interstellar
clouds are typical examples
– Dark-line or absorption-line spectrum
• Light from blackbody passes through cooler gas
leaving dark absorption lines
• Fraunhofer lines of Sun are an example
Emission Spectrum
Emission Spectrum
Continuous and Absorption Spectra
Astronomical Spectra
 Doppler Shift in Sound

• If the source of sound is moving, the pitch changes!

 Doppler Shift
in Light
– The shift in wavelength
is given as
 =  – o = ov/c
where  is the observed
(shifted) wavelength,
o is the emitted
wavelength, v is the
– If a source of light is set source non-relativistic
in motion relative to an radial velocity, and c is
observer, its spectral lines the speed of light
shift to new wavelengths
in a similar way
 Redshift and Blueshift

• An observed increase
in wavelength is called
a redshift, and a
decrease in observed
wavelength is called a
blueshift (regardless of
whether or not the
waves are visible)
• Doppler shift is used to
determine an object’s
velocity
 Absorption in the Atmosphere

• Gases in the Earth’s atmosphere absorb

electromagnetic radiation to the extent that most
wavelengths from space do not reach the ground
• Visible light, most radio waves, and some infrared
penetrate the atmosphere through atmospheric
windows, wavelength regions of high transparency
• Lack of atmospheric windows at other
wavelengths is the reason for astronomers placing
telescopes in space
Chapter 5
Telescopes
 Optical
Refracting lens: Light Telescopes
is bent
 Optical
Images can be Telescopes
formed through reflection or
refraction
Reflecting mirror: light is bounced back to a
central point
 Optical
Reflecting and Telescopes
refracting telescopes:
 Optical Telescopes
Modern telescopes are all reflectors:
• Light traveling through lens is refracted
differently depending on wavelength
• Some light traveling through lens is absorbed
• Large lens can be very heavy, and can only
be supported at edge
• Lens needs two optically acceptable
surfaces; mirror needs only one
 Opticaltelescopes:
Types of reflecting Telescopes
 Optical
Keck telescope Telescopes
 Hubble Space Telescope
Main mirror - 2.4 m in diameter
Designed for visible, infrared, and ultraviolet
radiation
 Hubble Space Telescope
Comparison best ground-based image of
M100, on the left, with the Hubble image on
the right
 Telescope Size
Light-gathering power: Improves detail
Brightness proportional to square of radius of
mirror
Below: (b) was taken with a telescope twice the
size of (a)
 Telescope Size
Resolution is proportional
to wavelength and
inversely proportional to
telescope size—bigger is
better!
 Telescope Size
Effect of improving resolution:
(a) 10′; (b) 1′; (c) 5″; (d) 1″
 Diffraction and Telescope
Resolution
Diffraction is an intrinsic property of waves,
and limits telescope resolution depending on
wavelength and size
 Images and Detectors
Image processing by computers can sharpen
images
 High-Resolution Astronomy
Atmospheric blurring: Due to air movements
 High-Resolution Astronomy
Solutions:
• Put telescopes on mountaintops, especially
in deserts
• Put telescopes in space
 High-Resolution
Adaptive Astronomy
optics: Track atmospheric changes
with laser; adjust mirrors in real time
 High-Resolution
These images Astronomy
show the
improvements
possible with
adaptive optics:
 Radio Astronomy
Radio telescopes:
• Similar to optical reflecting telescopes
• Prime focus
• Less sensitive to imperfections (due to longer
wavelength); can be made very large
Largest radioRadio Astronomy
telescope: 300-m dish at Puerto
Rico
 Radiomeans
Longer wavelength Astronomy
poor angular resolution
Advantages of radio astronomy:
Can observe 24 hours a day

• Clouds, rain, and snow

don’t interfere

• Observations at an
entirely different
frequency; get totally
different information
 Interferometry
•Combine information from several widely spread
radio telescopes as if they came from a single dish
• Resolution will be that of dish whose diameter =
largest separation between dishes
 Interferometry
Involves combining signals from two
receivers; the amount of interference depends
on the direction of the signal
 Interferometry
Can get radio images whose resolution is close
to optical
Interferometry can also be done with visible
light but is much more difficult due to shorter
wavelengths
 Space-Based Astronomy
Infrared radiation can image where visible
radiation is blocked
Generally can use optical telescope mirrors and
lenses
 Space-Based
Infrared telescopes Astronomy
can also be in space; the
image on the left is from the Infrared Astronomy
Satellite
 Space-Based Astronomy
Spitzer Space
Telescope – orbiting
the sun M81

M82
 5.7 Space-Based Astronomy
Ultraviolet observations
Must be done in space
Atmosphere absorbs
almost all ultraviolet
rays
 Space-Based Astronomy
X-rays and gamma rays will not reflect off mirrors
as other wavelengths do; need new techniques
X-rays will reflect at a very shallow angle and can
therefore be focused
 Space-Based Astronomy
X-ray image of supernova remnant
 Space-Based Astronomy
Gamma rays cannot be focused at all; images are
therefore coarse
 Full-Spectrum Coverage
Much can be learned from observing the same
astronomical object at many wavelengths.
Here, the Milky Way:
 Summary of Chapter 5 (cont.)
• Resolution of ground-based optical telescopes
is limited by atmospheric effects
• Resolution of radio or space-based telescopes
is limited by diffraction
• Active and adaptive optics can minimize
atmospheric effects
• Radio telescopes need large collection area;
diffraction limited
• Interferometry can greatly improve resolution
 Chapter 8
Survey of Solar Systems

Copyright (c) The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. Permission required for reproduction or display.
Stardate.org
If you follow Harry Potter ……………………
HNSKY capture
HNSKY capture
 The Solar System
• The Solar System is occupied by a diversity of
objects, but shows an underlying order in the
dynamics of their movements
• The planets form two main families:
– solid rocky inner planets
– gaseous/liquid outer planets
• Astronomers deduce that the Solar System
formed some 4.5 billion years ago out of the
collapse of a huge cloud of gas and dust
 The Sun

• The Sun is a star, a ball • Composed mainly of

of incandescent gas hydrogen (71%) and helium
whose output is (27%), it also contains
generated by nuclear traces of nearly all the other
reactions in its core chemical elements
 The Sun
• It is the most
massive object
in the Solar
System – 700
times the mass
of the rest of
the Solar
• Its large mass provides the
System
gravitational force to hold all the
combined
Solar System bodies in their orbital
patterns around the Sun
 The Planets

• Orbits are almost circular lying in nearly the same plane –

Pluto is the exception with a high (17°) inclination of its
orbit
The Planets
 The Planets
• All of the planets travel
counterclockwise
around the Sun (as seen
from high above the
Earth’s north pole)

• Six planets rotate

counterclockwise;
Venus rotates
clockwise (retrograde
rotation), and Uranus
appears to rotate on its
side
Earth
Eris
Ceres
The Planets
 Inner Planets

• Mercury, Venus, Earth, • Also known as

Mars terrestrial planets
• Small rocky (mainly
silicon and oxygen)
bodies with relatively
thin or no atmospheres
 Outer Planets

• Jupiter, Saturn, • Also referred to as

Uranus, and Neptune Jovian planets
• Jovian planets are much
• Gaseous, liquid, or icy
larger than terrestrial
(H2O, CO2, CH4, NH3) planets and do not have
a well-defined surface
 Dwarf Planets
• Pluto and similar objects fail to fit into either
family
• Recently, scientists have discovered more
than 200 similar objects orbiting the Sun at
the same distance as Pluto
• In 2006, a new family was introduced – the
dwarf planets
– Massive enough to pull themselves spherical
– Orbits have not been swept clear of debris
 Satellites
• The number of planetary satellites
changes frequently as more are
discovered!
– Jupiter 63
– Saturn 60
– Uranus 27
– Neptune 13
– Mars 2
– Earth 1
– Mercury and Venus are moonless
– Even Pluto and Eris have moons!
 Asteroids and Comets

• Composition and size

– Asteroids are rocky or metallic bodies ranging in
size from a few meters to 1000 km across (about
1/10 the Earth’s diameter)
– Comets are icy bodies about 10 km or less across
that can grow very long tails of gas and dust as
they near the Sun and are vaporized by its heat
 Asteroids and Comets
• Their location within Solar System
– Most asteroids are in the asteroid belt between
Mars and Jupiter indicating that these asteroids are
the failed building-blocks of a planet

– Some comets may also come from a disk-like

swarm of icy objects that lies beyond Neptune and
extends to perhaps 1000 AU, a region called the
Kuiper Belt
pronounced rhyming with "viper
Apophis (The 2036 Asteroid)
 Asteroids and Comets

Most comets orbit the Sun far beyond Pluto in

the Oort cloud, a spherical shell extending
from 40,000 to 100,000 AU from the Sun
 Measuring Composition
• Since the inner and outer planets differ
dramatically in composition, it is important
to understand how composition is
determined
• A planet’s reflection spectrum can reveal a
planet’s atmospheric contents and the
nature of surface rocks
• Seismic activity has only been measured on
Earth for the purposes of determining
interior composition
 Measuring Composition: Density

• A planet’s average density is determined by

dividing a planet’s mass by its volume
– Mass determined from Kepler’s modified third law
– Volume derived from a planet’s measured radius
 Measuring Composition: Density
• Once average density known, the following
factors are taken into account to determine a
planet’s interior composition and structure:
– Densities of abundant, candidate materials
– Variation of these densities as a result of
compression due to gravity
– Surface composition determined from reflection
spectra
– Material separation by density differentiation
– Mathematical analysis of equatorial bulges
 Analysis Concludes:

• The terrestrial planets, with average densities ranging

from 3.9 to 5.5 g/cm3, are largely rock and iron, have
iron cores, and have relative element ratios similar to the
Sun except for deficiencies in lightweight gasses
 Analysis Concludes:

• The Jovian planets, with average densities ranging from

0.71 to 1.67 g/cm3, have relative element ratios similar
to the Sun and have Earth-sized rocky cores
 Age of the Solar System
• All objects in the Solar System seem to have
formed at nearly the same time, out of the same
original cloud of gas and dust
• Radioactive dating of rocks from the Earth,
Moon, and some asteroids suggests an age of
about 4.5 billion yrs
• A similar age is found for the Sun based on
current observations and nuclear reaction rates
 Bode’s Law
• First noted in 1766, formalized
mathematically by J. E. Bode in 1778
– 0 3 6 12 24 48 96 192 384
– 4 7 10 16 28 52 100 196 388
– 0.4 0.7 1.0 1.6 2.8 5.2 10.0 19.6 38.8
• Does a pretty good job, up to a point
 Origin of the Solar System
• A theory of the Solar System’s formation must
account for the following:
– Planets orbit in the same direction and in the same plane
– Rocky inner planets and gaseous/liquid/icy outer planets
– Compositional trends in the solar system
– All Solar System bodies appear to be less than 4.5
billion years old
– Other details – structure of asteroids, cratering of
planetary surfaces, detailed chemical composition of
surface rocks and atmospheres, etc.
 The Solar Nebula Hypothesis
• Derived from 18th
century ideas of Laplace
and Kant
• Proposes that Solar
System evolved from a
rotating, flattened disk
of gas and dust (an
interstellar cloud), the
outer part of the disk
becoming the planets
and the inner part
becoming the Sun
 The Solar Nebula Hypothesis
• This hypothesis
naturally explains the
Solar System’s flatness
and the common
direction of motion of
the planets around the
Sun
• Interstellar clouds are
common between the
stars in our galaxy and
this suggests that most
stars may have planets
around them
 Interstellar Clouds
• Come in many
shapes and sizes –
one that formed Solar
System was probably
a few light years in
diameter and 2 solar
masses
• Typical clouds are
71% hydrogen, 27%
helium, and traces of
the other elements
 Interstellar Clouds
• Clouds also contain
tiny dust particles
called interstellar
grains
– Grain size from large
molecules to a few
micrometers
– They are a mixture of
silicates, iron and
carbon compounds,
and water ice
In the Beginning…

• Triggered by a
collision with
another cloud or a
nearby exploding
star, rotation forces
clouds to
gravitationally
collapse into a
rotating disk
The Solar Nebula

• A few million years pass

for a cloud to collapse
into a rotating disk with a
bulge in the center
• This disk, about 200 AU
across and 10 AU thick,
is called the solar nebula
with the bulge becoming
the Sun and the disk
condensing into planets
Disk Observations
Temperatures in the Solar Nebula

• Before the planets formed, the inner part of

the disk was hot, heated by gas falling onto
the disk and a young Sun – the outer disk
was colder than the freezing point of water
 Condensation
• Condensation
occurs when gas
cools below a
critical temperature
at a given gas
pressure and its
molecules bind
together to form
liquid/solid particles
Condensation in the Solar Nebula
– Iron vapor will condense at 1300 K, silicates will
condense at 1200 K, and water vapor will condense
at room temperature in air
– In a mixture of gases, materials with the highest
vaporization temperature condense first
– Condensation ceases when the temperature never
drops low enough
– Sun kept inner solar nebula (out to almost Jupiter’s
orbit) too hot for anything but iron and silicate
materials to condense
– Outer solar nebula cold enough for ice to condense
Formation of Planets
 Accretion
– Next step is for the tiny
particles to stick
together, perhaps by
electrical forces, into
bigger pieces in a
process called accretion
– As long as collisions are
not too violent, accretion
leads to objects, called
planetesimals, ranging
in size from millimeters
to kilometers
Planetesimals
• Planetesimals in the inner
solar nebula were rocky-
iron composites, while
planetesimals in the outer
solar nebula were icy-
rocky-iron composites
• Planets formed from
“gentle” collisions of the
planetesimals, which
dominated over more
violent shattering
collisions
 Formation of the Planets
• Simulations show that
planetesimal collisions
gradually lead to
approximately circular
planetary orbits
• As planetesimals grew in
size and mass their
increased gravitational
attraction helped them
grow faster into clumps
and rings surrounding the
Sun
 Formation of the Planets
• Planet growth was
especially fast in the
outer solar nebula due
to:
– Larger volume of
material to draw upon
– Larger objects (bigger
than Earth) could start
gravitationally capturing
gases like H and He
Continuous Bombardment

• Continued
planetesimal
bombardment and
internal radioactivity
melted the planets
and led to the
density
differentiation of
planetary interiors
Formation of Moons

• Moons of the outer

planets were probably
formed from
planetesimals orbiting
the growing planets
• Not large enough to
capture H or He, the
outer moons are mainly
rock and ice giving
them solid surfaces
Final Stages

• Rain of
planetesimals
cratered surfaces
• Remaining
planetesimals
became small
moons, comets, and
asteroids
 Formation of Atmospheres
• Atmospheres were the last planet-forming process
• Outer planets gravitationally captured their
atmospheres from the solar nebula
• Inner planets created their atmospheres by
volcanic activity and perhaps from comets and
asteroids that vaporized on impact
• Objects like Mercury and the Moon are too small
– not enough gravity – to retain any gases on their
surfaces
 Exosolar Planets
• Evidence exists for
planets around other
nearby stars
• The new planets are not
observed directly, but
rather by their
gravitational effects on
their parent star
• These new planets are a
surprise - they have huge
planets very close to their
parent stars
 Exosolar Planets
• Idea: The huge planets
formed far from their stars
as current theory would
project, but their orbits
subsequently shrank
• This migration of planets
may be caused by
interactions between
forming planets and
leftover gas and dust in
the disk
A Sample of Exoplanets
 Chapter 9
The Terrestrial Planets

Copyright (c) The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. Permission required for reproduction or display.
 The Terrestrial Planets

• The four terrestrial planets – Mercury, Venus,

Earth, and Mars – have similar sizes and structure
• These rocky worlds orbit in the inner part of the
Solar System, too small and too warm to have
captured massive hydrogen atmospheres like the
Jovian giants
• They have very few natural satellites – the Earth
has the relatively large Moon and Mars has two
small captured asteroids as moons
 Terrestrial Planet Overview
• Mercury – smallest
terrestrial planet, looks like
Moon (gray, bare,
cratered), essentially no
atmosphere
• Venus – covered with deep
sulfuric acid clouds in a
dense CO2 atmosphere,
hottest planet, immense
volcanic peaks tower over
desolate plains
Terrestrial Planet Overview
• Mars – polar caps of ice
and CO2, vast red deserts
with craters and dunes,
canyons, and dry river
beds, ancient volcanoes,
thin CO2 atmosphere
• Earth – blue seas, white
clouds and ice caps, red
deserts, green jungles,
mountains
 Terrestrial Planet Overview

• Planetary size coupled with distance from Sun is

the cause for these differences!
 Mercury
• Mercury’s radius is 1/3 and its
mass 1/20 that of Earth
• Circular craters cover the
surface with the largest one
being Caloris Basin with a
diameter of 1300 km
• Unlike the Moon where they
are found almost exclusively
in maria, congealed lava flows
are found in many of
Mercury’s old craters and
pave much of its surface
Scarps

• Enormous scarps
(cliffs), formed as
Mercury cooled,
and shrank,
wrinkling like a
dried apple
 Caloris Basin

• Largest crater basin on Mercury

• 1300 km across!
• Odd trough-like patterns near the center
 ChaoticTerrain

• “Chaotic terrain”
feature opposite side
of planet from Caloris
Basin possibly caused
by seismic waves
generated by impact
that created Caloris
Mercury’s Temperature
• Mercury’s noon
temperature at the equator
(about 710 K = 820° F)
and nighttime temperature
(80 K = -320° F) are near
the Solar System’s surface
extremes
• These extremes result
from Mercury’s proximity
to the Sun and its lack of
atmosphere
Mercury’s Atmosphere?
• Its low mass and
proximity to the Sun do
not allow Mercury to
retain an atmosphere of
any significance
• Its proximity to the Sun
suggests that Mercury
never had a significant
atmosphere
 Mercury’s Interior
• Mercury’s very high
average density suggests
that its interior is iron-rich
with only a thin rock
(silicate) mantle
• Two possible reasons for a
thin silicate surface:
– Silicates did not condense
as easily as iron in the hot
inner solar nebula where
Mercury formed
– Rocky crust was blasted off
by an enormous impact
Another Large Impact Hypothesis
Mercury’s Magnetic Field
• Mercury’s very weak
magnetic field probably
due to:
– Small molten core
– Slow rotation rate
 Mercury’s Rotation
• Mercury spins very
slowly with a sidereal
rotation period of
58.646 Earth days,
exactly 2/3 its orbital
period around the Sun
of 87.969 Earth days
• Consequently, Mercury
spins 3 times for every 2
trips around the Sun
 Mercury’s Rotation
• Such a ratio of periods is called a resonance
– Mercury’s resonance is the result of the Sun’s
tidal force on Mercury and its very elliptical
orbit – the Sun cannot lock Mercury into a
synchronous 1:1 rotation because of the high
eccentricity of Mercury
• Mercury’s solar day is 176 Earth days,
longer than its year!
• Because of Mercury’s slow rotation, near
perihelion the Sun will briefly reverse
direction in the Hermean sky
Venus

• Venus has a mass and

diameter very close to
that of Earth
• However, the two
planets have radically
different surfaces and
atmospheres
 The Atmosphere of Venus

• Reflected spectra and

spacecraft
measurements show
the Venusian
atmosphere is 96%
CO2, 3.5% N2, and
small amounts of
H2O and other gases
 The Atmosphere of Venus
• The clouds of Venus are
sulfuric acid droplets
with traces of water
– The clouds are very high
and thick, ranging from
30 km to 60 km above the
surface
– Surface cannot be seen
through clouds
– Some sunlight penetrates
to surface and appears as
tinged orange due to
clouds absorbing blue
wavelengths
 The Atmosphere of Venus
• The atmosphere is
extremely dense,
reaching pressures about
100 times that of Earth’s
• The lower atmosphere is
very hot with
temperatures of 750 K
(900° F) at the surface,
enough to melt lead
• Spacecraft have landed
on Venus, but do not
survive long
 The Greenhouse Effect on Venus
• Large amounts of CO2 in the
Venusian atmosphere create
an extremely strong
greenhouse effect
• The effect is so strong
Venus’s surface is hotter (750
K!) than Mercury’s although
Venus is farther from the Sun
• The high temperature and
density of the atmosphere
then create the high Venusian
atmospheric pressure
 The Surface of Venus
• Ground features can be
mapped with radar
from Earth and
spacecraft orbiting
Venus since radar can
penetrate the Venusian
clouds
• Venus’s surface is less
mountainous and
rugged than Earth, with
most of its surface low,
gently rolling plains
 The Surface of Venus
• Only two major highlands, Ishtar Terra and Aphrodite
Terra and about 8% of the surface, rise above the plains
to form land masses similar to terrestrial continents
 The Surface of Venus
• Ishtar Terra is about
the size of Greenland
and is studded with
volcanic peaks –
Maxwell Montes, the
highest, is at 11 km
above the average
level of the planet
(the equivalent “sea
level” reference)
 Surface Features
• Radar maps have shown
many puzzling surface
features (or lack thereof)
– Few plate tectonic features:
continental blocks, crustal
rifts, trenches at plate
boundaries
– A few distorted impact
craters and crumbled
mountains
– Volcanic landforms
dominate: peaks with
immense lava flows, “blisters
of uplifted rock, grids of long
narrow faults, peculiar lumpy
terrain
Surface Features
• These features indicate a
young and active surface
– Venus’s original surface
has been destroyed by
volcanic activity
– The current surface is not
more than 500 million
years old (much younger
than Earth’s) with some
regions less than 10
million
 Active Surface?
• Volcanic eruptions
have not been directly
observed
– Some lava flows appear
fresh
– Electrical discharges on
Venus indicative of
eruptions
– Brief increases in
atmospheric sulfur
content also indicative
of eruptions
 Active Surface?
• Numerous volcanic
peaks, domes, and
uplifted regions suggest
that heat flows less
uniformly within Venus
than Earth – “hot spot”
generation of volcanoes
dominate on Venus,
which is not the case on
Earth
 Venus is not Earth’s twin!
• Venus still evolving into
the smooth heat flow
patterns found on Earth
• Earth rocks have more
trapped water in them,
making Earth rocks
“runnier” than Venusian
rocks and the Earth crust
thinner (which will allow
easier cracking of the
Interior of Venus probably crust into plates for
very similar to Earth – iron tectonic movement)
core and rock mantle
 First Image from Venus

• Pictures from the Russian Venera landers show a

barren surface covered with flat, broken rocks lit
by the pale orange sunlight – sampling also
indicated the rocks are volcanic
 Rotation of Venus
• Radar measurements show Venus is the slowest
rotating planet, taking 243 Earth days to rotate
once, and its spin is retrograde (“backward”)
• Two possible causes of this slow retrograde
rotation:
– Venus was struck shortly after its birth by a huge
planetesimal
– Tidal forces from the Sun and perhaps Earth may have
shifted its spin axis over time
• Solar day on Venus is 117 Earth days
• Venus rotates too slowly to generate a magnetic
field
Rotation of Venus
 Mars
• Although its diameter
is 1/2 and its mass
1/10 that of Earth,
Mars is the planet
that most resembles
the Earth
• Mars extensively
photographed by the
Mariner, Viking, and
Mars Global
Surveyor spacecraft
 Mars
• On a warm day, the
temperature hits about
50° F (10° C)
• Winds sweep dust and
patchy ice crystal clouds
through a sky that
generally is clear enough
for its surface to be seen
from Earth
• Sparkling white polar
caps contrast with the
reddish color of most of
the planet
 Vallis Marineris
• A rift running along the equator stretching 4000
km long, 100 km wide, and 7 km deep
• This canyon, named after Mariner, dwarfs the
Grand Canyon and would span the U.S.
The Tharsis Bulge
• At midlatitudes, there
is the huge uplands
called the Tharsis
bulge
– Dotted with volcanic
peaks including
Olympus Mons, which
rises 25 km above its
surroundings (3 times
higher than Mt. Everest
on Earth)
Largest Mountain in the Solar
System
 The Tharsis Bulge
• Believed formed as hot
material rose from
the deep interior and
forced the surface
upward
• Scarcity of impact
craters put its age at no
older than 250 million
years
• May have created
gigantic Valles
Marineris
Polar Ice Caps
• Change in size with
seasons (Mars tilt
similar to Earth’s)
• Thin atmosphere
creates more severe
extremes in the seasons
leading to large ice cap
size variations
• Southern cap is frozen
CO2 (dry ice) and its
diameter varies from
5900 km in winter to
350 km in summer
Polar Ice Caps
• Northern cap shrinks to
about 1000 km, has
surface layer of CO2,
but is primarily water
ice and has separate
layers indicative of
climate cycles
(including “ice ages”)
• Water contained in
Mars caps is far less
than that in Earth’s
caps
 Dune Fields

• Martian poles are

bordered by
immense deserts
with dunes blown
by winds into
parallel ridges
Water on Ancient Mars
• From winding nature of
features that often contain
“islands”, it is inferred
that water once flowed on
Mars
• No surface liquid is now
present
• Huge lakes and small
oceans thought to have
once existed – evidence
comes from smooth traces
that look like old beaches
around edges of craters
and basins
Ancient Lake?
 Mesas on Mars
• Image from
Mars Global
Surveyor, a
Mars orbiter
that ended its
mission in
2007
• A flat-topped
mesa
 Martian River Delta

• A view of what
appears to be a
dried-up river
delta
 Lake Sediments
• Closeup image
of rock at the
Opportunity
landing site
• Possibly formed
from sediment
at the bottom of
a salty lake or
ocean
 The Atmosphere of Mars
• Clouds and wind blown
dust are visible evidence
that Mars has an
atmosphere
• Spectra show the
atmosphere is mainly
CO2 (95%) with traces of
N2 (3%), oxygen and
water
• The atmosphere’s density
is about 1% that of the
Earth’s
 The Atmosphere of Mars
• The lack of atmospheric
density and Mars distance
from the Sun make the
planet very cold
– Noon temperatures at the
equator reach a bit above
the freezing point of water
– Night temperatures drop to
a frigid 218 K (-67° F)
– Thus, most water is frozen,
locked up either below the
surface as permafrost or in
the polar caps as solid ice
 The Atmosphere of Mars
• Clouds, generally made
of dry ice and water-ice
crystals, are carried by
the winds
• As on Earth, the winds
arise from warm air that
rises at the equator,
moves toward the poles,
and is deflected by the
Coriolis effect
• Winds are generally
gentle, but can strengthen
and carry lots of dust!
Not a drop of rain…

• No rain falls, despite

clouds
– Atmosphere is too
cold and dry
– Fog seen in valleys
and ground frost has
been observed
– CO2 “snow” falls on
poles during winter
Morning Frost
 Ancient Atmosphere of Mars
• Dry river beds indicate
liquid water flowed in
Mars’s past
• This implies that Mars had
to have a denser atmosphere
(higher pressure) to prevent
the fast vaporization of
surface water into the
atmosphere
• Cratering indicates that this
thicker atmosphere
disappeared about 3 billion
years ago
Splash Craters
 Where did the atmosphere go?

• 2 ways Mars lost its thick atmosphere

– Mars was struck by a huge asteroid that blasted
the atmosphere into space
– Mars’s low gravity coupled with low volcanic
activity produced a net loss of gas molecules
into space over the first 1-2 billion years of its
existence, decreasing the effectiveness of the
greenhouse effect to maintain a warm
atmosphere
 The Martian Interior
• Differentiated like the Earth’s interior into a
crust, mantle, and iron core
• Having a mass between that of dead
Mercury and lively Earth/Venus implies
Mars should be intermediate in tectonic
activity
– Numerous volcanic peaks and uplifted
highlands exist
– Olympus Mons and other volcanoes do not
show any craters on their slopes indicating they
may still occasionally erupt
 The Martian Moons
• Phobos and Deimos • Both are cratered,
are about 20 km implying bombardment
across and are by smaller objects
probably captured
asteroids
• Their small size
prevents gravity
from pulling them
into spherical
shapes
 Life on Mars?
• Interest in life on Mars grew enormously with
the misinterpretation of observations made by
astronomer Giovonni Schiaparelli in 1877, who
called certain straight-line features on Mars
“canali” meaning “channels”
– English-speaking countries interpreted this as
“canals” and the search for intelligent life on Mars
began
– Spacecraft photos later revealed features on Mars to
be natural land structures
 Life on Mars?
• Viking spacecraft
landed on Mars to
search for life up closer
– no evidence found
• In 1996, a meteorite was
found on Earth with a
Mars origin
– Certain meteorite
structures suggested
Martian bacteria
– Most scientists today are
unconvinced
Why Are the Terrestrial
Planets So Different?
 Role of Mass and Radius

• Mass and radius affect interior temperature

• This in turn determines the level of tectonic
activity
• Low-mass, small-radius planets will be cooler
inside and hence less active than larger planets
• This relationship is in fact observed with
Mercury (the least active), then Mars, then
Venus/Earth
 Role of Internal Activity
• Internal activity also affects a planet’s atmosphere
since volcanic gases are the most likely source of
materials
• Low mass Mercury and Mars will have a smaller
source of age than Venus/Earth and the low surface
gravity of these small planets also means they will have
trouble retaining the gases they receive
• Mars, Venus, and Earth all probably started with CO2
atmospheres with traces of N2 and H2O, but were then
modified by sunlight, tectonic activity, and, in the case
of the Earth, life
 Role of Sunlight
• Sunlight warms a planet in a manner that depends on
the planet’s distance from the Sun – the closer the
warmer
• Amount of warming depends on the amount and
makeup of the atmospheric gases present
• Solar warming and atmospheric chemistry will also
determine the structure of the atmosphere, which may
“feed back” into the amount of warming that occurs
• For example, warmer Venus lifts water vapor to great
heights in its atmosphere, whereas at cooler Earth,
water condenses out at lower heights and the upper
atmosphere is almost totally devoid of water
 Role of Water Content
• Great differences in water content of upper atmospheres
of Earth and Venus has lead to a drastic difference
between their atmospheres at lower levels
• Water at high altitudes in Venusian atmosphere is lost to
photodissociation as solar ultraviolet light breaks H2O
apart with the H escaping into space
• Venus, as a result, has lost most of its water, whereas
Earth, with its water protected at lower altitudes, has not
• The water near Earth’s surface then makes possible
many chemical reactions not found on Venus – for
example, CO2 (a greenhouse gas) is removed from the
atmosphere by dissolving in water
 Role of Biological Processes
• Biological processes also remove CO2 from the atmosphere
– Dissolved CO2 in ocean water is used by sea creatures to make
shells of calcium carbonate
– When these creatures die, their shells fall to ocean bottom forming
a sediment
– The sediment eventually changes to rock, thus tying up CO 2 for
long periods of time
– With CO2 so readily removed from our atmosphere, mostly N 2 is
left
– Some CO2 can be recycled back into the atmosphere by tectonic
activity
• Green plants breaking down H2O during photosynthesis is
very likely the reason Earth’s atmosphere has a high oxygen
content
 Chapter 10
The Outer Planets

Copyright (c) The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. Permission required for reproduction or display.
 The Outer Worlds…
• Beyond the orbit of Mars, the low temperatures of the solar
nebula allowed condensing bodies there to capture hydrogen and
hydrogen-rich gases
• This, together with the vast amount of material in the outer Solar
System, lead to the creation of the four large Jovian planets –
Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune
• Composed mainly of gaseous and liquid hydrogen and its
compounds, these planets lack solid surfaces and may have
cores of molten rock
• The dwarf planets Pluto and Eris are exceptions to these rules
resembling the ice and rock makeup of the giant planets’ larger
moons
• The moons of the outer planets form families of miniature solar
systems, although individually each moon presents a unique
combination of size, structure, and appearance
 Jupiter
• Jupiter is the largest
planet both in diameter
and mass: more than10×
Earth’s diameter and
300× the mass!
• Dense, richly colored
parallel cloud bands
cloak the planet
• Atmosphere is mainly
H, He, CH4, NH3, and
H2O
 Jupiter
• Clouds appear to be
particles of water, ice, and
ammonia compounds
• Bright colors of clouds
may come from complex
organic molecules or
compounds of sulfur or
phosphorous
• Jupiter rotates once about
every 10 hours with this
fast rotation leading to a
significant equatorial bulge
 Jupiter’s Interior

• Jupiter’s average density is 1.3 • Deeper still, liquid hydrogen

g/cm3 – indicates an interior compresses into liquid metallic
composed of very light hydrogen, a material scientists
elements only recently created in tiny
• Interior becomes increasingly high-pressure chambers
dense with depth, gas turning to • An iron rocky core, a few times
liquid hydrogen about 10,000 bigger than the Earth, probably
km down resides at the center
 Jupiter’s Interior

• Jupiter, with a core

temperature of about
30,000 K, emits more
energy than it receives
– Possibly due to heat left
over from its creation
– Planet may still be
shrinking in size
converting gravitational
energy into heat
 Jupiter’s Atmosphere

• General convection
pattern:
– Heat within Jupiter
carries gas to the top of
the atmosphere
– High altitude gas
radiates into space,
cools and sinks
 Jupiter’s Atmosphere

• Coriolis effect turns rising and sinking

gases into powerful jet streams (about 300
km/hr) that are seen as cloud belts
 Jupiter’s Atmosphere

• Adjacent belts, with different relative speeds, create

vortices of various colors, the largest being the
Great Red Spot, which has persisted for over 300
years
The Great Red Spot
 Jupiter’s Magnetic Field
• Convection in the deep
metallic liquid hydrogen
layer coupled with
Jupiter’s rapid rotation
creates a powerful
magnetic field
– 20,000× stronger than the
Earth’s field, it is the
largest planetary magnetic
field
– Jupiter’s auroral activity
and intense radio
emissions are indicative
of its magnetic field
Jupiter’s Magnetic Field

• Magnetic field also

traps charged particles
far above the planet
in regions resembling
the Earth’s Van Allen
radiation belts
• Lightning in clouds
has been observed
 Jupiter’s Ring
• Solar radiation and
collisions with charged
particles trapped in
Jupiter’s magnetic field
exert a friction on the
ring dust that will
eventually cause the dust
to drift into the
atmosphere

Jupiter has a system of

• To maintain the rings,
rings made of tiny particles new dust must be
of rock dust and held in provided – possibly
orbit by Jupiter’s gravity from collision fragments
ejected from the Jovian
moons
 The Moons of Jupiter

• Jupiter currently has 63 natural

satellites or moons
• Number changes frequently as more
are discovered
• Four innermost moons are called the
Galilean Moons
 The Moons of Jupiter

• Except for Europa, all are larger than the Moon

• Formed in a process similar to the formation of the
Solar System – the density of these satellites
decreases with distance from Jupiter
 Io

• Gravitational tidal forces

induced from Jupiter and
Europa keeps Io’s interior
hot
• Volcanic plumes and lava
flows are the result
Europa
• Very few craters indicate
interior heating by
Jupiter and some
radioactive decay
• Surface looks like a
cracked egg indicating a
“flow” similar to glaciers
on Earth
• Heating may be enough
to keep a layer of water
melted below the crust
Liquid Water Ocean on Europa?
 Ganymede and Callisto

• Look like our Moon with • Callisto may have

grayish brown color and subsurface liquid water
covered with craters • Ganymede is less cratered
• However, their surfaces than Callisto indicating
maria-type formations
are mostly ice – whitish although tectonic movement
craters a very good cannot be ruled out
indication of this
 Other Observations

• Galilean average • Rest of Jupiter’s moons are

densities indicate their much smaller than the
Galilean satellites and they
interiors to be composed are cratered
mainly of rocky material • Outermost moons have orbits
• Differentiation may have that have high inclinations
allowed iron to sink to suggesting that they are
captured asteroids
core
 Saturn
• Saturn is the
second largest
planet, 10× Earth’s
diameter and 95 ×
Earth’s mass
• Its average density
of 0.7 g/cm3 is less
than than of water
Saturn looks different from Jupiter –
• Low density, like temperature is low enough for
Jupiter, suggests a ammonia gas to freeze into cloud
composition mostly particles that veil its atmosphere’s
of hydrogen and its deeper layers
compounds
 Interior of Saturn

• Saturn radiates more energy conversion of gravitational

than it receives, but unlike energy from falling helium
Jupiter, this energy probably droplets as they condense in
comes from the Saturn’s interior
The Rings of Saturn
• Rings are wide but thin
– Main band extends from about
30,000 km above its
atmosphere to about twice
Saturn’s radius (136,000 km)
– Faint rings can be seen closer
to Saturn as well as farther
away
– Thickness of rings: a few
hundred meters
– Visible A, B and C rings, from
outside in
 Ring Structure
• Rings not solid, but
made of a swarm of
individual bodies
– Sizes range from
centimeters to meters
– Composition mainly
water, ice, and
carbon compounds
and is not uniform
across rings
Ring Structure

• Large gaps due to

resonances with Saturn’s
moons located beyond the
rings
• Narrow gaps due to complex
interaction between ring
particles and tiny moons in
the rings
• Shepherding satellites may
deflect ring particles into a
narrow stream between
them.
 The Roche Limit
• Any object held together solely by gravity will break
apart by tidal forces if it gets too close to the planet.
• Distance of breakup is called the Roche limit and is
2.44 planetary radii if object and planet have the same
density
• All planetary rings lie near their planet’s Roche limit
• Existence of side-by-side ringlets of different
compositions indicates rings supplied by varied
comets and asteroids
• Objects bonded together chemically will survive
Roche limit
The Roche Limit
 Saturn’s Moons
• Saturn has several large moons and many more smaller
ones
• Like Jupiter, most of the moons form a mini-solar
system, but unlike Jupiter, Saturn’s moons are of similar
densities indicating that they were not heated by Saturn
as they formed
• Saturn’s moons have a smaller density than those of
Jupiter indicating interiors must be mostly ice
• Most moons are inundated with craters, many of which
are surrounded by white markings of shattered ice
• The moons also have several surface features that have
yet to be explained
Saturn’s Moons
 Titan
• Saturn’s largest moon
• Larger than Mercury
• Mostly nitrogen
atmosphere
• Solid surface with
liquid oceans of
methane
• The Huygens Probe
landed on the surface
Images from Titan’s Surface
 Uranus
• Uranus was not discovered
until 1781 by Sir William
Herschel
• While small relative to
Jupiter/Saturn, Uranus is
4× larger in diameter than
Earth and has 15× the mass
• At 19 AU, Uranus is
difficult to study from
Earth, but even close up
images from Voyager
reveal a rather featureless
object
 Atmosphere of Uranus

• Atmosphere is rich in • Methane gas and ice are

hydrogen and methane responsible for the blue
color of Uranus’s
atmosphere
 Interior of Uranus
• With a density of 1.2 g/cm3 and smaller size, Uranus
must contain proportionally fewer light elements than
Jupiter/Saturn
• Density is too low for it to contain much rock or iron
• Uranus’s interior probably contains water, methane,
and ammonia
• Size of equatorial bulge supports the idea that the
interior is mostly water and other hydrogen-rich
molecules and that it may have a rock/iron core
• It is currently not known if the core formed first and
attracted lighter gases that condensed on it, or the core
formed by differentiation after the planet formed.
Interior of Uranus
 Uranus’s Odd Tilt

• Uranus’s spin axis is tipped so • Uranus may have been struck

that it nearly lies in its orbital during its formation and splashed
plane out material to form the moons, or
gravitational forces may have
• The orbits of Uranus’s moons tipped it
are similarly tilted
 Rings of Uranus
• Uranus is encircled by a
set of narrow rings
composed of meter-sized
objects
• These objects are very
dark, implying they are
rich in carbon particles or
organic-like materials
• The extremely narrow
rings may be held in place
by shepherding satellites
 Moons of Uranus
• Uranus has 5 large
moons and several small
ones that form a regular
system
• Moons probably
composed of ice and
rock and many show
heavy cratering
• Miranda is very unique
in that it appears to have
been torn apart and
reassembled
 Neptune
• Neptune is similar in size to
Uranus
• Deep blue world with cloud
bands and vortex structures
– the Great “Dark” Spot
being, at one time, the most
prominent feature
• Neptune was discovered
from predictions made by
John C. Adams and Urbain
Leverrie, who calculated its
orbit based on disturbances
in Uranus’s orbit
Interior of Neptune
• Neptune’s interior is
probably similar to
Uranus’s – mostly
ordinary water
surrounded by a thin
atmosphere rich in
hydrogen and its
compounds and
probably has a
rock/iron core
 Neptune’s Atmosphere
• Neptune’s blue, like
Uranus, comes from
methane in its atmosphere
• Unlike Uranus, Neptune has
cloud belts
– Like Jupiter/Saturn, Neptune
radiates more energy than it
gains from the Sun
– The deep interior heat source
drives convective currents
which then lead, via the
Coriolis effect, to the visible
atmospheric belts
Rings of Neptune
• Neptune, like the other
giant planets, has rings
• They are probably debris
from satellites or comets
that have broken up
• They contain more dust
than the Saturn/Uranus
rings
• The rings are not
distributed uniformly
around the ring
indicating they are
relatively new
 Triton
• Triton’s orbit is “backwards” and is highly tilted with
respect to Neptune’s equator – Triton is perhaps a
captured planetesimal from the Kuiper belt
• Triton is large enough and far enough from the planet to
retain an atmosphere
• Triton has some craters with dark steaks extending from
them – at least one of which originates from a geyser
caught in eruption by the passing Voyager II
• The material in the geyser is thought to be a mixture of
nitrogen, ice, and carbon compounds heated beneath the
surface by sunlight until it expands and bursts to the
surface
Triton
Chapter 11:Small Bodies Orbiting
the Sun
 Kuiper Belt

The Kuiper Belt of comets spreads from

Neptune out 50 AU from the Sun
Oort Comet Cloud
 Comets

A. icy dirtball?

or

B. dirty snowball?
Composition of a Comet
Composition of a Comet
Comets lack tails until they enter the inner solar system.
Halley’s Comet

Period of orbit is 74-79 years

predicted by Edmond Halley
Nucleus very dark

Dirty snowball!
 Halley’s Comet
“I came in with Halley’s comet in 1835.
It is expecting to come again next year
(1910), and I expect to go out with it.
The Almighty has said no doubt: ‘ Now
here are two unaccountable freaks; they
Came in together, they must go out
Together.”

- Mark Twain, a Biography

Meteor Showers
Meteor Showers
Meteor Showers
 Meteroids
• meteroids: chunks of matter in space orbiting in the
Solar System ranging up to tens of meters across and
sometimes larger
• meteors: when these chunks hit the Earth’s
atmosphere and show up as streaks in the sky
• meteorite: when a fragment of a meteoroid survives
its passage through the Earth’s atmosphere
Meteorites
 Asteroids

Gaspra

Ida and its moon Dactyl

Ceres was the largest Asteroid, now it’s a
Dwarf Planet
Most asteroids orbit the Sun between Mars
and Jupiter
The Extinction of Dinosaurs
 Chapter 12
The Sun, Our Star

Copyright (c) The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. Permission required for reproduction or display.
 The Sun
• The Sun is a star, a luminous ball of gas more than 100
times bigger than the Earth
• Although seemingly quiescent from a naked eye view,
telescopic observations reveal a bevy of violent activity
– fountains of incandescent gas and twisting magnetic
fields
• The Sun’s core is equally violent with a furnace of
thermonuclear fire converting hydrogen into helium to
the tune of an energy production equivalent to the
detonation of 100 nuclear bombs
• The force of gravity keeps the Sun in check – for now
 The Sun
• With a radius 100× and a
mass of 300,000× that of
Earth, the Sun must
expend a large amount
of energy to withstand
its own gravitational
desire to collapse
• To understand this
process requires detailed
observations as well as
sophisticated
calculations involving
computer models and the
laws of physics
Properties of the Sun
• The Sun’s distance
from Earth (about 150
million km or 1 AU)
was once measured by
triangulation, but is
now done by radar
• Once the distance is
known, its diameter
(about 1.4 million km)
can be found from its
angular size (about 1/2
degree)
 Properties of the Sun
• From the Sun’s distance
and the Earth’s orbital
period, Kepler’s modified
third law gives the Sun’s
mass
• Mass and radius, the
surface gravity of the Sun
is found to be 30× that of
Earth
• Next, the surface
temperature (5780 K) is
found from the Sun’s color
and the use of Wien’s law
for a blackbody
Properties of the Sun
• Theoretical considerations
then establish the Sun as
gaseous throughout with a
core temperature of 15
million K
• From the amount of solar
energy that reaches the Earth
(4 × 1026 watts), this energy
must be replenished by fusion
processes in its core
• The Sun has plenty of
hydrogen for fusion: its
surface spectra shows
hydrogen is 71% and 27%
helium
The Structure of the Sun
The Solar Interior
• The low density upper
layers of the Sun, where
any photons created there
can freely escape into space
is called the photosphere
• The photosphere is yellow
“surface” we see with our
eyes
• Layers below the
photosphere are opaque,
photons created there are
readily absorbed by atoms
located there
 The Solar Interior

• Theoretical calculations show that the Sun’s surface

temperature and density both increase as the core is
approached
– The density is similar to that found at sea level on Earth at the
Sun’s surface and 100× that of water at the core
 The Radiative Zone
• Since the core is hotter
than the surface, heat
will flow outward from
the Sun’s center
• Near the Sun’s center,
energy is moved
outward by photon
radiation – a region
surrounding the core
known as the radiative
zone
 The Radiative Zone
• Photons created in
the Sun’s interior do
not travel very far
before being
reabsorbed – energy
created in the Sun’s
center will take about
16 million years to
eventually diffuse to
the surface!
 The Convection Zone

• Above the radiative

zone energy is more
efficiently
transported by the
rising and sinking of
gas – this is the
convection zone
Granulation

• Convection manifests
itself in the
photosphere as
granulation, numerous
bright regions
surrounded by narrow
dark zones
 The Sun’s Atmosphere

• The extremely low-density gases that lie above

the photosphere make up the Sun’s atmosphere
 The Sun’s Atmosphere
• The density of the atmosphere decreases steadily
with altitude and eventually merges with the
near-vacuum of space
• Immediately above the photosphere, the
temperature of the atmosphere decrease but at
higher altitudes, the temperature grows hotter,
reaching temperatures of several million Kelvin
• The reason for the increase in temperature is
unknown, but speculation is that Sun’s magnetic
field plays an important role
 The Chromosphere
• The lower part of the
atmosphere is referred to as
the chromosphere
– The chromosphere appears
as a thin red zone around the
dark disk of a totally
eclipsed Sun
– The red is caused by the
strong red emission line of
hydrogen H
– The chromosphere contains
millions of thin columns
called spicules, each a jet of
hot gas
 The Corona

• Temperature in the corona eventually reaches about 1 million K

(not much energy though due to low density)
• The corona, visible in a total solar eclipse, can be seen to reach
altitudes of several solar radii
• The corona is not uniform but has streamers and coronal holes
dictated by the Sun’s magnetic field
 How the Sun Works
• Structure of the Sun depends on
a balance between its internal
forces – specifically, a
hydrostatic equilibrium between
a force that prevents the Sun
from collapsing and a force that
holds it together
• The inward (holding) force is the
Sun’s own gravity, while the
outward (non-collapsing) force
arises from the Sun’s internal
gas pressure
• Without balance the Sun would
rapidly change!
 Pressure in the Sun

• Pressure in a gas comes from atomic collisions

• The amount of pressure is in direct proportion to the
speed of the atoms and their density and is expressed in
the perfect or ideal gas law
 Powering the Sun
• Given that the Sun loses energy as sunshine,
an internal energy source must be present to
maintain hydrostatic equilibrium
– If the Sun were made of pure coal, the Sun would
last only a few thousand years
– If the Sun were not in equilibrium, but creating
light energy from gravitational energy (the Sun is
collapsing), the Sun could last 10 million years
– These and many other chemical-based sources of
energy are not adequate to account for the Sun’s
several billion year age
 Powering the Sun

• Mass-energy is the key

– In 1905, Einstein showed that energy and
mass were equivalent through his famous
E = mc2 equation
– 1 gram of mass is equivalent to the energy
of a small nuclear weapon
– The trick is finding a process to convert
mass into other forms of energy
 Powering the Sun
• A detailed process for mass
conversion in the Sun called nuclear
fusion was found:
– Sun’s core temperature is high enough
to force positively charged protons
close enough together to bind them
together via the nuclear or strong force
– The net effect is that four protons are
converted into a helium nucleus (plus
other particles and energy) in a three-
step process called the proton-proton
chain
 Isotopes
• In the proton-
proton cycle,
isotopes are
intermediate steps
between protons
and their ultimate
fusion into 4He.
The Proton-Proton Chain
The Proton-Proton Chain: Step 1
The Proton-Proton Chain: Step 2
The Proton-Proton Chain: Step 3
 Solar Neutrinos
• The nuclear fusion
process in the Sun’s core
creates neutrinos
• Neutrinos lack electric
charge, have a very small
mass, escape the Sun’s
interior relatively
unaffected, and shower
the Earth (about 1 trillion
pass through a human per
second)
Solar Neutrinos
• A neutrino’s low
reactivity with other forms
of matter requires special
detection arrangements
– Detectors buried deep in
the ground to prevent
spurious signals as those
produced by cosmic rays
(high energy particles, like
protons and electrons, with
their source beyond the
Solar System)
– Large tanks of water and
special light detectors
 Solar Neutrinos
• Detected neutrinos are about three times less than
predicted – possible reasons:
– Model of solar interior could be wrong
– Neutrinos have properties that are not well understood
• Current view to explain measured solar neutrinos:
neutrinos come in three varieties (instead of previous
one), each with a different mass, and Earth detectors
cannot detect all varieties
• Important ramifications: A solar astronomy observation
of neutrinos may lead to a major revision of our
understanding of the basic structure of matter
 Solar Seismology
• Solar seismology is the study of the Sun’s
interior by analyzing wave motions on the
Sun’s surface and atmosphere
• The wave motion can be detected by the
Doppler shift of the moving material
• The detected wave motion gives temperature
and density profiles deep in the Sun’s interior
• These profiles agree very well with current
models
Solar Seismology
 Solar Magnetic Activity
• Surface waves are
but one type of
disturbance in the
Sun’s outer layers
• A wide class of
dramatic and lovely
phenomena occur
on the Sun and are
caused by its
magnetic field
 Interaction of Fields and Particles
• Charged particles
tend to spiral along
magnetic field lines
easier than they drift
across them
• Bulk motion of
plasma carries the
field along with it.
• Motion of the field
carries particles along
with it
Sunspots
• Dark-appearing regions
ranging in size from a few
hundred to a few thousand
kilometers across
• Last a few days to over a
month
• Darker because they are
cooler than their
surroundings (4500 K vs
6000 K)
• Cooler due to stronger
magnetic fields within them
 Origin of Sunspots

• Starved of heat from below, the surface cools where the

magnetic fields breach the surface creating a dark sunspot
 Prominences
• Prominences are
huge glowing gas
plumes that jut
from the lower
chromosphere
into the corona
 Solar Flares
• Sunspots give birth
to solar flares, brief
but bright eruptions
of hot gas in the
chromosphere
• Hot gas brightens
over minutes or
hours, but not
enough to affect the
Sun’s total light
output
 Solar Flares
• Strong increase in
radio and x-ray
emissions
• Intense twisting and
“breakage” of
magnetic field lines
is thought to be the
source of flares
 Coronal Mass Ejections
• Coronal mass
ejections can
explosively
shoot gas
across the Solar
System and
result in
spectacular
auroral displays
Impact of Solar Flares
 Heating of the Chromosphere and Corona

• While the Sun’s magnetic field cools sunspots and

prominences, it heats the chromosphere and corona
• Heating is caused by magnetic waves generated in the
relatively dense photosphere
– These waves move up into the thinning atmospheric gases,
grow in magnitude, and “whip” the charged particles found
there to higher speeds and hence higher temperatures
– Origin of waves may be from rising bubbles in convection
zone
Heating of the Chromosphere and Corona
 The Solar Wind
• The corona’s high temperature gives its atoms enough
energy to exceed the escape velocity of the Sun
• As these atoms stream into space, they form the solar
wind, a tenuous gas of hydrogen and helium that
sweeps across the entire Solar System
• The amount of material lost from the Sun via the Solar
Wind is insignificant
• Typical values at the Earth’s orbit: a few atoms per cm3
and a speed of about 500 km/sec
• At some point, the solar wind mingles with interstellar
space
 The Solar Cycle

• Sunspot, flare, and prominence activity change yearly

in a pattern called the solar cycle
• Over the last 140 years or so, sunspots peak in number
about every 11 years
• Climate patterns on Earth may also follow the solar
cycle
 Differential Rotation

• The Sun undergoes differential rotation, 25

days at the equator and 30 at the poles
 Cause of the Solar Cycle

• This rotation causes the Sun’s

magnetic field to “wind up” • The cycle ends when the field
increasing solar activity twists too “tightly” and
(magnetic field “kinks” that collapses – the process then
break through the surface) as it repeats
goes
 Changes in the Solar Cycle

• The cycle may vary from 6 to 16 years

• Considering the polarity direction of the sunspots, the
cycle is 22 years, because the Sun’s field reverses at the
end of each 11-year cycle
• Leading spots in one hemisphere have the same polarity,
while in the other hemisphere, the opposite polarity leads
 Solar Cycle and Climate

• Midwestern United States and Canada experience a

22-year drought cycle
• Few sunspots existed from 1645-1715, the Maunder
Minimum, the same time of the “little ice age in
Europe and North America
• Number of sunspots correlates with change in ocean
temperatures
 Chapter 13
Measuring the Properties of Stars

Copyright © The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. Permission required for reproduction or display.
 The Family of Stars
• Those tiny glints of light in the night sky are in
reality huge, dazzling balls of gas, many of which
are vastly larger and brighter than the Sun
• They look dim because of their vast distances
• Astronomers cannot probe stars directly, and
consequently must devise indirect methods to
ascertain their intrinsic properties
• Measuring distances to stars and galaxies is not
easy
• Distance is very important for determining the
intrinsic properties of astronomical objects
 Triangulation

– Measure length of a triangle’s

• Fundamental method for “baseline” and the angles from
measuring distances to nearby the ends of this baseline to a
stars is triangulation: distant object
– Use trigonometry or a scaled
drawing to determine distance to
object
Trigonometric Parallax
Calculating Distance Using Parallax

• A method of triangulation used by astronomers is called

parallax:
– Baseline is the Earth’s orbit radius (1 AU)
– Angles measured with respect to very distant stars
 Calculating Distance Using Parallax

• The shift of nearby stars is

small, so angles are dpc = 1/parc seconds
measured in arc seconds
• The parallax angle, p, is • A parsec is 3.26 light-
half the angular shift of the years (3.09 × 1013 km)
nearby star, and its distance • Useful only to distances
in parsecs is given by: of about 250 parsecs
 Example: Distance to Sirius

• Measured parallax
angle for Sirius is
0.377 arc second
• From the formula,
dpc = 1/0.377
= 2.65 parsecs
= 8.6 light-years
 Light, the Astronomer’s Tool
• Astronomers want to
know the motions,
sizes, colors, and
structures of stars
• This information helps
to understand the nature
of stars as well as their
life cycle
• The light from stars
received at Earth is all
that is available for this
analysis
Temperature
• The color of a star
indicates its relative
temperature – blue
stars are hotter than
red stars
• More precisely, a
star’s surface
temperature (in
Kelvin) is given by the
wavelength in
nanometers (nm) at
which the star radiates
most strongly
 Luminosity
• The amount of energy a
star emits each second is
its luminosity (usually
abbreviated as L)
• A typical unit of
measurement for
luminosity is the watt
• Compare a 100-watt
bulb to the Sun’s
luminosity, 4 × 1026
watts
Luminosity
• Luminosity is a
measure of a star’s
energy production (or
hydrogen fuel
consumption)
• Knowing a star’s
luminosity will allow
a determination of a
star’s distance and
radius
 The Inverse-Square Law

• The inverse-square law relates an object’s luminosity

to its distance and its apparent brightness (how bright it
appears to us)
 The Inverse-Square Law
• This law can be thought
of as the result of a fixed
number of photons,
spreading out evenly in
all directions as they
leave the source
• The photons have to
cross larger and larger
concentric spherical
shells.
• For a given shell, the
number of photons
crossing it decreases per
unit area
 The Inverse-Square Law
• The inverse-square law
(IS) is:

L
B
4 d 2

• B is the brightness at a
distance d from a source
of luminosity L
• This relationship is called
the inverse-square law
because the distance
appears in the
denominator as a square
 The Inverse-Square Law
• The inverse-square law
(IS) is:

L
B
4 d 2

• B is the brightness at a
distance d from a source
of luminosity L
• This relationship is called
the inverse-square law
because the distance
appears in the
denominator as a square
 The Inverse-Square Law
• The inverse-square law
is one of the most
important mathematical
tools available to
astronomers:
– Given d from parallax
measurements, a star’s L
can be found (A star’s B
can easily be measured
by an electronic device,
called a photometer,
connected to a
telescope.)
– Or if L is known in
advance, a star’s distance L
can be found B
4 d 2
The “Standard Candle” Method
• If an object’s intrinsic
brightness is known, its
distance can be determined
from its observed
brightness
• Astronomers call this
method of distance
determination the method
of standard candles
• This method is the
principle manner in which
astronomers determine
distances in the universe
Radius
• Common sense: Two
objects of the same
temperature but
different sizes, the
larger one radiates more
energy than the smaller
one
• In stellar terms: a star of
larger radius will have a
higher luminosity than a
smaller star at the same
temperature
 Knowing L “In Advance”
• We first need to know
how much energy is
emitted per unit area of
a surface held at a
certain temperature
• The Stefan-Boltzmann
(SB) Law gives this:
B  T 4

• Here  is the Stefan-

Boltzmann constant
(5.67 × 10-8 watts m-2K-4)
 Tying It All Together
• The Stefan-Boltzmann
law only applies to stars,
but not hot, low-density
gases
• We can combine SB and
IS to get:

L  4 R 2 T 4
• R is the radius of the star
• Given L and T, we can
then find a star’s radius!
Tying It All Together
 Tying It All Together
• The methods using the
Stefan-Boltzmann law
and interferometer
observations show that
stars differ enormously in
radius
– Some stars are hundreds of
times larger than the Sun
and are referred to as
giants
– Stars smaller than the
giants are called dwarfs
L  4 R 2 T 4
Example: Measuring the Radius of Sirius

• Solving for a star’s radius can be simplified if

we apply L = 4R2T4 to both the star and the
Sun, divide the two equations, and solve for
radius:
Rs=(Ls/Lsun)1/2(Tsun/Ts)2Rsun

• Where s refers to the star and  refers to the

Sun
• Given for Sirius Ls = 25L, Ts = 10,000 K, and
for the Sun T= 6000 K, one finds Rs = 1.8R
 The Magnitude Scale
• About 150 B.C., the Greek astronomer Hipparchus
measured apparent brightness of stars using units
called magnitudes
– Brightest stars had magnitude 1 and dimmest had
magnitude 6
– The system is still used today and units of measurement are
called apparent magnitudes to emphasize how bright a star
looks to an observer
• A star’s apparent magnitude depends on the star’s
luminosity and distance – a star may appear dim
because it is very far away or it does not emit much
energy
 The Magnitude Scale
• The apparent magnitude can be confusing
– Scale runs “backward”: high magnitude = low
brightness
– Modern calibrations of the scale create negative
magnitudes
– Magnitude differences equate to brightness ratios:
• A difference of 5 magnitudes = a brightness ratio of 100
• 1 magnitude difference = brightness ratio of
1001/5=2.512
 The Magnitude Scale
• Astronomers use absolute magnitude to
measure a star’s luminosity
– The absolute magnitude of a star is the apparent
magnitude that same star would have at 10 parsecs
– A comparison of absolute magnitudes is now a
comparison of luminosities, no distance
dependence
– An absolute magnitude of 0 approximately equates
to a luminosity of 100L
 The Spectra of Stars

• A star’s spectrum typically depicts the energy

it emits at each wavelength
• A spectrum also can reveal a star’s
composition, temperature, luminosity, velocity
in space, rotation speed, and other properties
• On certain occasions, it may reveal mass and
radius
 Measuring a Star’s Composition
• As light moves through the gas of a star’s
surface layers, atoms absorb radiation at some
wavelengths, creating dark absorption lines in
the star’s spectrum
• Every atom creates its own unique set of
absorption lines
• Determining a star’s surface composition is
then a matter of matching a star’s absorption
lines to those known for atoms
 Measuring a Star’s Composition

• To find the quantity of a given atom in the star, we

use the darkness of the absorption line
• This technique of determining composition and
abundance can be tricky!
 Measuring a Star’s Composition

• Possible overlap of absorption lines from

several varieties of atoms being present
• Temperature can also affect how strong (dark)
an absorption line is
Temperature’s Effect on Spectra
• A photon is absorbed when its energy matches
the difference between two electron energy
levels and an electron occupies the lower
energy level
• Higher temperatures, through collisions and
energy exchange, will force electrons, on
average, to occupy higher electron levels –
lower temperatures, lower electron levels
 Temperature’s Effect on Spectra
• Consequently, absorption lines will be present
or absent depending on the presence or absence
of an electron at the right energy level and this
is very much dependent on temperature
• Adjusting for temperature, a star’s composition
can be found – interestingly, virtually all stars
have compositions very similar to the Sun’s:
71% H, 27% He, and a 2% mix of the
remaining elements
 Early Classification of Stars

• Historically, stars were first classified into four

groups according to their color (white, yellow, red,
and deep red), which were subsequently subdivided
into classes using the letters A through N
 Modern Classification of Stars
• Annie Jump Cannon
discovered the classes
were more orderly in
appearance if rearranged
by temperature – Her
reordered sequence
became O, B, A, F, G,
K, M (O being the
hottest and M the
coolest) and are today
known as spectral
classes
 Modern Classification of Stars

• Cecilia Payne then

demonstrated the
physical connection
between temperature
and the resulting
absorption lines
Modern Classification of Stars
 Spectral Classification
• O stars are very hot and the weak hydrogen
absorption lines indicate that hydrogen is in a highly
ionized state
• A stars have just the right temperature to put
electrons into hydrogen’s 2nd energy level, which
results in strong absorption lines in the visible
• F, G, and K stars are of a low enough temperature to
show absorption lines of metals such as calcium and
iron, elements that are typically ionized in hotter stars
• K and M stars are cool enough to form molecules and
their absorption “bands” become evident
 Spectral Classification

• Temperature range: more than 25,000 K for O

(blue) stars and less than 3500 K for M (red) stars
• Spectral classes subdivided with numbers - the
Sun is G2
 Measuring a Star’s Motion
• A star’s motion is determined from the
Doppler shift of its spectral lines
– The amount of shift depends on the star’s
radial velocity, which is the star’s speed along
the line of sight
– Given that we measure , the shift in
wavelength of an absorption line of wavelength
, the radial speed v is given by:
  
v c
  
– c is the speed of light
 Measuring a Star’s Motion
• Note that  is the
wavelength of the
absorption line for an object
at rest and its value is
determined from laboratory
measurements on
nonmoving sources
• An increase in wavelength
means the star is moving
away, a decrease means it is
approaching – speed across
the line on site cannot be
determined from Doppler   
shifts v c
  
 Measuring a Star’s Motion
• Doppler measurements and related analysis
show:
– All stars are moving and that those near the Sun
share approximately the same direction and
speed of revolution (about 200 km/sec) around
the center of our galaxy
– Superimposed on this orbital motion are small
random motions of about 20 km/sec
– In addition to their motion through space, stars
spin on their axes and this spin can be measured
using the Doppler shift technique – young stars
are found to rotate faster than old stars
 Binary Stars
• Two stars that revolve around each other as a
result of their mutual gravitational attraction
are called binary stars
• Binary star systems offer one of the few ways
to measure stellar masses – and stellar mass
plays the leading role in a star’s evolution
• At least 40% of all stars known have orbiting
companions (some more than one)
• Most binary stars are only a few AU apart – a
few are even close enough to touch
 Visual Binary Stars
• Visual binaries
are binary
systems where we
can directly see
the orbital motion
of the stars about
each other by
comparing
images made
several years
apart
 Spectroscopic Binaries

• Spectroscopic binaries are • Doppler analysis of the

systems that are inferred to be spectra can give a star’s speed
binary by a comparison of the and by observing a full cycle
system’s spectra over time of the motion the orbital
period and distance can be
determined
 Stellar Masses

• Kepler’s third law as modified by Newton is

(m  M ) P  a 2 3

• m and M are the binary star masses (in solar masses), P is their period of
revolution (in years), and a is the semimajor axis of one star’s orbit about
the other (in AU)
 Stellar Masses

• P and a are determined from observations (may take a few years)

and the above equation gives the combined mass (m + M)
• Further observations of the stars’ orbit will allow the determination
of each star’s individual mass
• Most stars have masses that fall in the narrow range 0.1 to 30 M
 Eclipsing Binaries

• A binary star system in which one star can eclipse the

other star is called an eclipsing binary
• Watching such a system over time will reveal a
combined light output that will periodically dim
 Eclipsing Binaries
• The duration and
manner in which
the combined light
curve changes
together with the
stars’ orbital speed
allows astronomers
to determine the
radii of the two
eclipsing stars
 Summary of Stellar Properties
• Distance
– Parallax (triangulation) for nearby stars (distances less than
250 pc)
– Standard-candle method for more distant stars
• Temperature
– Wien’s law (color-temperature relation)
– Spectral class (O hot; M cool)
• Luminosity
– Measure star’s apparent brightness and distance and then
calculate with inverse square law
– Luminosity class of spectrum (to be discussed)
• Composition
– Spectral lines observed in a star
 Summary of Stellar Properties
• Radius
– Stefan-Boltzmann law (measure L and T, solve for R)
– Interferometer (gives angular size of star; from distance and
angular size, calculate radius)
– Eclipsing binary light curve (duration of eclipse phases)
• Mass
– Modified form of Kepler’s third law applied to binary stars
• Radial Velocity
– Doppler shift of spectrum lines
 Putting it all together –
The Hertzsprung-Russell Diagram
• So far, only properties of stars have been
discussed – this follows the historical
development of studying stars
• The next step is to understand why stars have
these properties in the combinations observed
• This step in our understanding comes from the
H-R diagram, developed independently by
Ejnar Hertzsprung and Henry Norris Russell
in 1912
 The HR Diagram
• The H-R diagram is a
plot of stellar
temperature vs
luminosity
• Interestingly, most of the
stars on the H-R diagram
lie along a smooth
diagonal running from
hot, luminous stars
(upper left part of
diagram) to cool, dim
ones (lower right part of
diagram)
The HR Diagram

• By tradition, bright stars

are placed at the top of
the H-R diagram and
dim ones at the bottom,
while high-temperature
(blue) stars are on the
left with cool (red) stars
on the right (Note:
temperature does not run
in a traditional direction)
The HR Diagram
• The diagonally running
group of stars on the H-R
diagram is referred to as
the main sequence
• Generally, 90% of a
group of stars will be on
the main sequence;
however, a few stars will
be cool but very luminous
(upper right part of H-R
diagram), while others
will be hot and dim
(lower left part of H-R
diagram)
 Analyzing the HR Diagram
• The Stefan-Boltzmann law is a key to
understanding the H-R diagram
– For stars of a given temperature, the larger the
radius, the larger the luminosity
– Therefore, as one moves up the H-R diagram, a
star’s radius must become bigger
– On the other hand, for a given luminosity, the larger
the radius, the smaller the temperature
– Therefore, as one moves right on the H-R diagram, a
star’s radius must increase
– The net effect of this is that the smallest stars must
be in the lower left corner of the diagram and the
largest stars in the upper right
Analyzing the HR Diagram
 Giants and Dwarfs

• Stars in the upper left

are called red giants
(red because of the
low temperatures
there)
• Stars in the lower right
are white dwarfs
• Three stellar types:
main sequence, red
giants, and white
dwarfs
 Giants and Dwarfs

• Giants, dwarfs, and

main sequence stars
also differ in average
density, not just
diameter
• Typical density of
main-sequence star is
1 g/cm3, while for a
giant it is 10-6 g/cm3
The Mass-Luminosity Relation
• Main-sequence stars obey
a mass-luminosity
relation, approximately
given by:

LM 3

• L and M are measured in

solar units
• Consequence: Stars at top
of main-sequence are
more massive than stars
lower down
 Luminosity Classes
• Another method was discovered to measure the
luminosity of a star (other than using a star’s
apparent magnitude and the inverse square law)
– It was noticed that some stars had very narrow
absorption lines compared to other stars of the
same temperature
– It was also noticed that luminous stars had
narrower lines than less luminous stars
• Width of absorption line depends on density:
wide for high density, narrow for low density
Luminosity Classes
 Luminosity Classes
• Luminous stars (in upper right
of H-R diagram) tend to be less
dense, hence narrow absorption
lines
• H-R diagram broken into
luminosity classes: Ia (bright
supergiant), Ib (supergiants),
II (bright giants), III (giants),
IV (subgiants), V (main
sequence)
– Star classification example: The
Sun is G2V
Summary of the HR Diagram
• Most stars lie on the main
sequence
– Of these, the hottest stars
are blue and more
luminous, while the coolest
stars are red and dim
– Star’s position on sequence
determines its mass, being
more near the top of the
sequence
• Three classes of stars:
– Main-sequence
– Giants
– White dwarfs
 Variable Stars

• Not all stars have a constant luminosity – some

change brightness: variable stars
• There are several varieties of stars that vary and are
important distance indicators
• Especially important are the pulsating variables – stars
with rhythmically swelling and shrinking radii
 Mira and Cepheid Variables

• Variable stars are classified by the shape and

period of their light curves – Mira and Cepheid
variables are two examples
 The Instability Strip

• Most variable stars

plotted on H-R
diagram lie in the
narrow “instability
strip”
 Method of Standard Candles
• Step 1: Measure a star’s brightness (B) with a
photometer
• Step 2: Determine star’s Luminosity, L
• Use combined formula to calculate d, the distance to
the star
• Sometimes easier to use ratios of distances
– Write Inverse-Square Law for each star
– Take the ratio: Lnear L far
Bnear  , B far 
4 d 2
near 4 d 2
far
2
Bnear  d far 
 
B far  d near 
Summary
 Chapter 14
Stellar Evolution

Copyright © McGraw-Hill Education. Permission required for reproduction or display.

 The Life of a Star
• Gravity holds a star together while the pressure of its gases
supports it against gravity’s pull.
• A star generates its supporting pressure from energy produced
in its core by the conversion of hydrogen into helium.
• The hydrogen cannot last forever – consequently, the star must
evolve (age).
• Once its fuel is exhausted, the star dies – quietly into a white
dwarf or violently into a neutron star or black hole.
• The violent explosions of dying large stars seed interstellar
space with materials for the next generation of stars and the
elements vital to human life.
Stellar Flowchart
 Mass Is the Key
• Stars require millions to billions of years to evolve – a
time that is incredibly slow by human standards.
• A star’s evolution can be studied two ways:
– Stellar models via computer calculations that take into
account the relevant physics
– Observations – different stars represent different snapshots in
the life of a star
• The lifeline of a star is found to depend critically on its
mass.
• The possible endings of a star’s life naturally divide
stars into two groups: low-mass stars and high-mass
stars, with the division set at about 10 solar masses.
 The Importance of Gravity
• Gravity drives stellar evolution from a star’s
formation out of a cloud to its final death.
– The collapsing cloud will heat because of gravity.
– The main-sequence star will sustain itself as gravity
compresses and heat the core to fusion
temperatures.
– Gravity will sculpt the final collapse of the star into
a white dwarf, neutron star, or black hole.
• The amount of mass (gravity) will also drive
the duration of the evolution.
 The Life of Our Sun

• The Sun was born out of an interstellar cloud that

gravitationally collapsed over a time span of a few
million years.
• Fusing hydrogen into helium in its core, the Sun will
reside on the main sequence for 10 billion years and in
the process convert 90% of its core hydrogen into helium.
 The Old Age of Our Sun
• Starved of fuel, the core will
shrink and grow hotter as the
outer surface expands and
cools transforming the Sun into
a red giant.
• After one billion years, the red
giant’s core will be hot enough
to begin fusing helium.
• The Sun will then transform
into a pulsating yellow giant.
 The Death of Our Sun

• As the core’s helium fuel begins to expire, the Sun will

once again transform into a red giant, but only bigger
than before.
• The high luminosity of the red giant will drive the
Sun’s atmosphere into space leaving behind its core.
• The core will cool and dwindle into a white dwarf.
 The Life of a High-Mass Star

• The early life of a high-mass star is similar to the Sun:

– Collapses from an interstellar cloud and resides on the main
sequence
– Proceeds through these stages much faster than the Sun,
spending less than 100 million years on the main sequence
 The Old Age of a High-Mass Star
• A high-mass star then
passes through the
pulsating yellow giant
stage before it turns into
a red giant.
• In the red giant phase,
the core begins to fuse
one element into
another creating
elements as massive as
iron.
 The Death of a High-Mass Star

• Once iron is reached, the core is out of fuel and it

collapses.
– The star’s heavy elements are blown into space along
with its outer layers.
– A neutron star or black hole is left behind.
 Interstellar Gas Clouds
• General
Characteristics
– Gas: hydrogen
(71%), helium
(27%), others
– Dust: microscopic
particles of
silicates, carbon,
and iron
– Temperature:
Around 10 K
Initial Collapse
• Low temperature leads to too
low pressure to support cloud
against gravitational
collapse.
• Collapse may be triggered by
collision with another cloud,
a star explosion, or some
other process.
• Non-uniformity, clumpy
nature of gas leads to
formation of smaller,
warmer, and denser clumps.
 To the Protostar Stage

• Rotating dense clumps flatten into disk.

• About one million years: small, hot dense core at center of
disk forms – a protostar
• Stars generally form in groups – similar age
 Protostars

• Characteristics
– Temperature: About 1500 K
– Shine at infrared and radio wavelengths
– Low temperature and obscuring dust prevents visible detection
– May be found in “Bok globules”, dark blobs 0.2-2 lys across
with masses of up 200 solar masses
 Further Collapse
• Gravity continues to draw
material inward.
• Protostar heats to 7 million K
in core and hydrogen fusion
commences.
• Collapse of core ceases, but
protostar continues to acquire
material from disk for 106
years.
• In-falling material creates
violent changes in brightness
and ultimately a strong
outflow of gas.
Bipolar Outflows

• Jets also create

bipolar outflows
around protostar.
– Easily seen at radio
wavelengths
– Clears away most
gas and dust
around protostar
 T-Tauri Stars

• Young stars still partially immersed in interstellar matter

• Vary erratically in brightness, perhaps due to magnetic activity
• Intense outward gas flows from surfaces
• Occupy H-R diagram just above main-sequence
 Stellar Mass Limits
• Stars smaller than 0.1 M are rarely seen since their mass
is too small for their cores to initiate fusion reactions.
• Objects with masses between planets and stars are called
brown dwarfs, “failed stars” extremely dim and difficult
to observe.
• Upper mass limit of stars (about 30 M) due to extreme
temperatures and luminosity preventing additional
material from falling on them - intense radiation may
even strip off outer layers of star
 A Star’s Mass Determines Its Core Temperature
• All other things being equal, a
more massive star has a higher
gravitational attraction than a
less massive star.
• Hydrostatic equilibrium then
requires a higher gas pressure
for the larger gravity of a
massive star.
• The higher pressure can be
achieved, from the perfect gas
law, by a higher temperature.
 Fusion Cycles of High- and Low-Mass Stars

• Fusion in the core

– Low mass stars:
proton-proton chain
– High mass stars:
CNO cycle –
carbon, nitrogen,
and oxygen act as
catalysts for H
fusion at higher core
temperatures
The C-N-O Cycle
Structure of High- and Low-Mass Stars
• Energy transport from
the core
– Low mass stars: Inner
radiative zone, outer
convection layer
– High mass stars: Inner
convection zone, outer
radiative layer
– All stars: Outer layers
of hydrogen gas are
unavailable for fusion
reactions in the core.
Stellar Lifetimes
 Stellar Lifetime Examples

• Some lifetimes:
– 1 M star with 1 L:10 billion years
– 2 M star with 20 L:1 billion years
– 30 M star with 105 L:3 million years
• Short lifetime of massive main-sequence stars
implies blue stars have formed recently and will
still be associated with their birthing cloud
 Leaving the Main Sequence

• When a main-sequence star exhausts its fuel, the core drops

its pressure, is compressed by gravity, and heats up.
• The increasing temperature of the core eventually ignites
hydrogen gas just outside the core in a region called the
shell source.
 Becoming a Red Giant

• The shell source increases the pressure around the core and
pushes surrounding gases outward.
• The star expands into a red giant as the radius increases and
the surface cools.
• The size of red giant depends on initial mass of star.
 Structure of a Red Giant

• Most of a giant star’s volume is in its huge outer envelope,

while most of its mass is in its Earth-sized core.
• Convection carries energy through the outer opaque
envelope to the surface.
 Triple-Alpha Process

• Nuclear Fuels Heavier Than Hydrogen

– To fuse nuclei containing larger numbers of protons
requires higher impact velocities (higher temperatures) to
overcome the bigger electrostatic repulsion.
 Giant Stars
• As a giant star compresses its
core, higher temperatures are
achieved and helium fusion
occurs at about 100 million K.
– This fusion is referred to as the
triple alpha process.
– Fusion of helium proceeds
smoothly for a high-mass star
since its core’s pressure and
temperature are high.
– A low-mass star must compress its
core to such an extent that it first
becomes degenerate before fusing.
Degeneracy in Low-Mass Giant Stars
• Degenerate gas is so tightly packed that the electrons
interact not as ordinary charged particles but according
to laws of atomic physics.
– A consequence of these laws is that no two electrons of the
same energy can occupy the same volume.
– The degenerate gas behaves more like a solid – it does not
expand as its temperature rises.
• When a degenerate, low-mass star begins to fuse
helium, it will not expand.
– The core temperature increases exponentially.
– Helium fusion proceeds explosively in what is called a
helium flash.
 Yellow Giants
• The explosive energy converts the core back to a
normal gas.
– The core expands and the star’s surface shrinks.
– The red giant turns into a yellow giant.
• Most luminous yellow giants on an H-R diagram are
aging high-mass stars.
• Less luminous yellow giants are low-mass stars that
have completed their first red giant stage.
• Regardless of mass, many yellow giants pulsate in
size and luminosity.
 Lyrae and Cepheid Variable Stars
• Two important groups of
variable (pulsating) stars:
– RR Lyrae (first discovered in
constellation of Lyra)
• Mass comparable to Sun’s with 40
times the luminosity
• Periods of about half a day
– Cepheid (first discovered in
constellation of Cepheus)
• More massive than Sun and about
20,000× more luminous
• Periods from 1-70 days
 Mira and T-Tauri Variable Stars

• Other groups:
– Mira (pulsating
red giants)
– T-Tauri (irregular
variables)
 Why Variable Stars Pulsate

• Giant stars pulsate because their atmospheres trap some of their

radiated energy.
– This heats the atmosphere, which then expands and allows
radiation to escape.
– Expanding atmosphere cools, then contracts trapping the radiation
again.
 The Instability Strip

• The high “opacity” (ability to trap radiation) of a

star’s atmosphere only occurs in the limited
instability strip of the H-R diagram.
 The Period-Luminosity Law
• Many pulsating stars
obey a law that
relates their
luminosity to their
period of pulsation –
the longer the period,
the more luminous
the star.
• Reason: Larger stars
are more massive and
have less surface
gravity.
 The Death of Sun-like Stars

• Sun spends 11-12 billion years on the main-

sequence consuming its hydrogen and becoming a
red giant
• Subsequently, it spends about 100 million years
fusing helium in its core
 Death of a Low-Mass Star
• As helium burns in the star’s core, its radius shrinks, but
never enough to heat it to carbon-fusing temperatures.
• Luminosity increases, and the outer surface expands to red
supergiant sizes and temperature down to 2500 K.
• Carbon and silicon flakes (grains) form in this cool
environment and are driven out by radiation pressure.
• The grains carry the gas into space – a planetary nebula is
formed – and the inner core becomes visible.
• Planetary nebula (no relation to planets) glows from UV
radiation from bare core.
Death Trajectory of a Low-Mass Star
Planetary Nebulae
 Old Age of Massive Stars
• Massive stars do not stop
with helium fusion – a
variety of nuclear reactions
creates heavier elements.
• Formation of heavy elements
by nuclear burning processes
is called nucleosynthesis.
• It is proposed that all
elements in the universe
heavier than helium were
created by massive stars.
 Nucleosynthesis
• Typical fusion process: 4He + 12C
= 16O +  where  is a gamma ray
photon
• As the temperature of the core
increases, heavier elements are
fused forming concentric layers of
elements.
• Iron is the heaviest element fused
(at about 1 billion K) - larger
elements will not release energy
upon being fused.
• A massive star (30 M) may take
less than 10 million years to
develop its Earth-sized iron core.
Death of a High-Mass Star
 Core Collapse of Massive Stars
• The inability of iron to release energy upon fusing signals
the end of a massive star’s life.
• As the star’s core shrinks, protons and electrons merge to
form neutrons and the core is transformed into a sphere of
neutrons.
• The loss of electrons in the creation of the neutrons causes
the core pressure to drop suddenly – nothing remains to
support the star, so its inner layers collapse.
• In a matter of seconds the Earth-sized iron core is
transformed into a 10-km, extremely dense ball of neutrons.
• The outer layers of the star collapse and heat to billions of
degrees as they slam into the neutron core.
 Supernovae

• The gas pressure surges

and thrusts the outer
layers back into space
in a gigantic explosion
– a supernova.
 Material for New Stars
• Elements synthesized by nuclear
burning are mixed with the star’s
outer layers as they expand into
space.
– Speeds may exceed 10,000 km/sec.
– Materials mix with interstellar
matter to be recycled into a new
generation of stars.
– Free neutrons from the explosion
synthesize heavier elements (e.g.,
gold, platinum, uranium.
– A supernova releases neutrinos in
large quantities.
 Supernovae in Other Galaxies
• In a few minutes, more
energy is released than
during the star’s entire
life.
• It brightens to several
billion times the
luminosity of the Sun – a
luminosity larger than all
the stars in the Milky
Way combined.
 Supernova Remnants
• The huge, glowing cloud of
debris that expands from a
supernova explosion
sweeping up interstellar
material as it goes is called a
supernova remnant.
– During a 1-100 year time
frame, a supernova will
expand from 0.03 ly to several
light-years in diameter.
– Supernova remnants have a
more ragged look compared to
planetary and other nebulae.
 Crab Nebula
• Two well-known
supernova remnants:
– Crab Nebula – Visual
outburst witnessed by
astronomers in China in
1054 A.D.
– Supernova 1987A –
Most recent visual
supernova and a rare
blue supergiant
explosion
 History of Stellar Evolution Theories
• Aristotle wrote more than 2000 years ago that stars are heated by their
passage through the heavens, but never considered that they evolved
• In the 18th century, Immanuel Kant described the Sun as a fiery sphere,
formed from the gases gravitated to the center of a solar nebula
• In the 1850s and 1860s, Lord Kelvin and Hermann von Helmholtz used
the physics of gases and gravity to mathematically determine the
pressure and temperature profiles inside a star, but were unable to find a
suitable energy source to maintain the profiles
• The 20th century brought the physics of atoms and relativity to the
problem of stellar evolution
– Sir Arthur Eddington recognized the importance of mass as a source of
energy and the need to account for energy transport
– By 1940s, the need for computers to solve the problem of stellar evolution
was recognized
 Testing Stellar Evolution Theories
• The best demonstration that
modern theory is correct
comes from comparing the H-
R diagrams of real star clusters
with theoretically determined
diagrams.
– All stars within a cluster form
at about the same time and are
therefore about the same age.
– Depending on the age of the
cluster, some stars will be on
the main sequence and others
will not.
 Star Clusters on the HR Diagram
• Since more massive stars
evolve faster and in a well-
defined fashion (at least
theoretically speaking), the stars
on or off the main sequence will
not be random – a cluster of
stars will show a distinctive
pattern that is tied to the
individual evolutionary tracks
of the stars.
• Real stars from a given cluster
and plotted on an H-R diagram
in fact show these distinctive
patterns.
 The “Turnoff Point”

• This success now allows astronomers to date clusters

by determining a cluster’s “turnoff point.”
 Chapter 15
Stellar Remnants: White Dwarfs, Neutron Stars,
and Black Holes

Copyright © The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. Permission required for reproduction or display.
 Stellar Corpses
• The three end states of stars, white dwarfs, neutron
stars, and black holes are known as compact stars
– Compact because their matter has been crushed into
very dense exotic forms
– A piece of white dwarf material the size of an ice
cube weighs 16 tons
– A neutron star resembles a giant atomic nucleus
– Black holes have warped spacetime to the point that
even light cannot escape
 Stellar Corpses
• Compact does not mean
inconspicuous
– Capturing matter from a
nearby object will
convert gravitational
energy into an extremely
brilliant display
– Under certain
conditions, the captured
matter may lead to nova
and type I supernova
explosions
White Dwarfs
• White dwarfs are compact
stars with a mass similar to
the Sun’s and a diameter
about that of the Earth
• Despite their high surface
temperature of about 25,000
K, they are very dim due to
their small size
• Their light is generated from
residual heat (no fusion) in
the star’s interior
 White Dwarfs
• Being the remaining core of a
low mass star (the outer
layers having been propelled
into space), a white dwarf is
mainly carbon and oxygen
with a thin hydrogen/helium
surface layer
• Initially, with a surface
temperature of about 150,000
K, a white dwarf will cool
over time (many billions of
years) until it becomes a
black dwarf emitting no
visible light
Origin of White Dwarfs
 Structure of White Dwarfs
• White dwarfs are in hydrostatic equilibrium
– Gravity is balanced by the pressure of electron
degeneracy
– Degeneracy allows the white dwarfs to shrink
with increasing mass
• A white dwarf’s mass cannot exceed a certain
limit (Chandrasekhar limit) – if it does, it will
collapse
• A white dwarf’s high density (106 g/cm3)
implies that atoms are separated by distances
less than the normal radius of an electron orbit
Degeneracy and the Chandrasekhar Limit
• The basis of degeneracy pressure is the
exclusion principle: a law of physics that
limits the number of electrons that may
occupy any given volume
– Degeneracy pressure depends only on gas
density, not temperature – when a degenerate gas
is compressed, it heats up, but this temperature
increase does not affect the pressure
– Degenerate gases are less “springy”
Degeneracy and the Chandrasekhar Limit
• Adding mass to a degenerate white dwarf
makes it shrink and increases its gas pressure
to offset the increased gravity
– Continually adding mass will eventually make
the white star collapse
– The point of maximum mass for collapse is
called the Chandrasekhar Limit and has a value
of 1.4 M
– All observations of white dwarf masses appear to
conform to the 1.4 M limit
 Gravitational Redshift and White Dwarfs

• White dwarfs can induce a

gravitational redshift in
their spectra
– Photons climbing out of the
gravitational field of a
white dwarf must expend
energy to due so
– Photons cannot change
their speed, so they
increase their wavelength
– The amount of redshift
depends on the white
dwarf’s mass and radius
 Gravitational Redshift and White Dwarfs
• Knowing a white dwarf’s
radius (from its luminosity
and temperature), the
gravitational redshift will
give the white dwarf’s
mass
• Mass determination via
the gravitational redshift
provides a means to
determine a white dwarf’s
mass in isolation
(Kepler’s law and a binary
pair are not needed)
 White Dwarfs in Binary Systems

• In a binary system, a white dwarf may gravitationally

capture gas expelled from its companion
– The captured gas will be rich in hydrogen and represent a fuel
source to the white dwarf
– Hydrogen is compressed and heated on the white dwarf’s
surface
 White Dwarfs in Binary Systems

• The gas eventually reaches ignition – a fusion reaction in

a degenerate gas results in an explosion: a nova
• Novas may be visible to the eye and may occur repeatedly
for the same white dwarf (the explosion does not destroy
the white dwarf) as long as the white dwarf never exceeds
the Chandrasekhar limit
Novas
 Type I Supernova

• The result of a white dwarf accreting enough mass to

exceed the Chandrasekhar limit
• The white dwarf collapses, igniting carbon and oxygen
• The fusion ignition blows the star apart creating heavy
elements in the process (e.g., silicon, nickel, and iron)
 Neutron Stars
• A neutron star is one possible end state of a
supernova explosion of a massive (> 8 M).
• Theoretically derived in the 1930s by Walter
Baade and Fritz Zwicky, a neutron star has the
following properties:
– Radius about 10 km
– Mass between 1 M and a maximum of about
2-3 M
• Because of its small size, neutron stars were
thought to be unobservable
 Formation of a Neutron Star

• A massive (> 8 M) star forms a large iron core at the

end of its life.
• This core cannot support its own weight and collapses
on in on itself, collapsing past the “white dwarf” level.
• A neutron star is one possible outcome of this collapse.
 Pulsars

• In 1967, Jocelyn Bell, a graduate student of Anthony

Hewish, detected an odd radio signal with a rapid pulse
rate of one burst per 1.33 seconds
• Over the next few months, more pulsating radio sources
were discovered and eventually were named pulsars
 Pulsars
• Ordinary pulsating
variables obey a
period-density relation
where the period is
inversely proportional
to the square root of
its density
• Later pulsar discoveries had
– The long periods of the
much shorter periods – the
first pulsars discovered
were consistent with theoretical neutron star was
their being white dusted off for consideration,
dwarfs although at first, it appeared
neutron stars would pulsate too
fast
 Pulsars Explained
• The key to explaining pulsars
turned out to be a rotating
neutron star, not a pulsating one
– By conservation of angular
momentum, an object as big as the
Sun with a one-month rotation
period will rotate more than 1000
times a second if squeezed down
to the size of a neutron star
– Such a size reduction is exactly
what is expected of a collapsing
massive star’s iron core
Conservation of Angular Momentum
 A Pulsar’s Emission
• A collapsing massive star is
expected to retain its magnetic
field endowing the neutron
star with an extremely
powerful magnet field
• The powerful magnetic field
is such that it beams radiation
energy in two opposing
directions
• The beamed radiation together
with the rapid spin gives the
pulsar its observed
characteristics
 A Pulsar’s Emission
• Like dynamos on Earth,
the spin of a neutron star’s
magnetic field (not
necessarily aligned with
the physical spin axis)
creates an electric field
– This electric field is intense
and rips charged particles
from the surface and
channels them into two
narrow beams at the
magnetic poles
 A Pulsar’s Emission
• The charged particles
accelerate to speeds close to
that of light and in so doing
produce radio emissions along
the polar axes (visible light
and gamma rays may be
produced in very young
pulsars)
• Radiation produced in this
manner is called nonthermal
radiation or synchrotron
radiation
 A Pulsar’s Emission

• The pulsation of a pulsar is the result of one of

the radio beams sweeping across the Earth
 Emissions from a Neutron Star

• Electric/magnetic fields of a rotating pulsar

exert forces on charged particles in its vicinity,
speeding them up
– The charged particles in turn exert a reaction
force on the neutron star
– Consequently, neutron stars should slow down
with age – this is what is observed
Interior Structure of a Neutron Star
 Internal Structure of Neutron Stars
• Neutron stars occasionally speed
up
– When a neutron star is born, the
very hot crust may shrink and
suddenly crack making the star’s
radius smaller
– Conservation of angular momentum
then requires the neutron star to
speed up – another glitch
• Neutron stars are eventually
expected to slow to the point that
their emissions become
undetectable – the pulsar “dies”
 X-Ray Binary Stars
• Neutron stars in binary systems
sometimes emit intense X-rays –
such stars are called X-ray
binaries
• There are several types of X-ray
binaries
– X-ray bursters
• Intense bursts of X-rays emitted at
irregular time intervals
• Thought to be caused by gas falling
on and exploding off a neutron star’s
surface (akin to a nova)
 X-Ray Binary Stars
– X-ray pulsars
• Rapid, regular pulse of X-rays
like a regular pulsar
• Thought to be caused by “hot
spots” near the magnetic poles
where gas from companion falls
– Millisecond pulsars
• Extremely rapid rotation of 1000
times per second
• Thought to be caused by
“spinning up” as a result of
acquiring mass from its
companion via an accretion disk
 Gravitational Waves
• If a compact object orbits a companion or even if two
typical stars rapidly orbit each other, these systems
should generate gravitational waves – much like
twirling your finger in a pond will propagate water
waves
– Gravitational waves are theoretically very weak – none
have been detected to date
• Indirectly though, gravitational waves should cause a
binary system to lose energy, making the star move
together
– Two neutron stars orbiting each other appear to be losing
energy at just the rate predicted
Gravitational Waves
 Black Holes
• Massive stars greater than 10 M upon collapse
compress their cores so much that no pressure is
capable of supporting it – a black hole results
• A black hole is an “object” (region of space) that
has an escape velocity that exceeds the speed of
light – hence the name
– Using the equation for the escape velocity at an
object’s surface, equating it to the speed of light c,
and solving for radius R:
R = 2GM/c2
– where M is the object’s mass
 Black Holes
• Einstein’s general theory of
relativity gave a mathematical and
physical picture to black holes
– Gravity is related to the curvature of
space
– A black hole is a place where the
curvature of space is so extreme that a
hole forms
– Typical analogy – imagine a water
bed with a heavier and heavier object
placed on it
– This analogy is only approximate and
a mathematical treatment is very
difficult
 The Schwarzschild Radius

• Karl Schwarzschild did find a simple expression for the

size of a black hole – its Schwarzschild radius – and it
was exactly the same as the radius derived by the escape
velocity approach
 The Event Horizon

• The spherical surface that encompasses the black hole is

called the event horizon
– This name expresses the fact that everything within the black
hole (any events) are beyond our ability to see (like a ship
beyond the horizon)
– We are only capable of knowing a black hole’s mass, electric
charge, and spin (a spinning black hole will not have a
spherical event horizon)
 The Event Horizon
• A black hole’s
gravitational field is no
different than any
other object with the
same mass (except for
their interiors)
• The curvature of space
will bend light and this
is indeed observed
Formation of a Black Hole
 Observing a Black Hole

• General approach to “observing” black

holes is an indirect approach – look for an
effect on an object that can be uniquely
attributed to an interaction with a black hole
 Observing a Black Hole

• A black hole in a close binary system

– An accretion disk may form around the black hole as it draws
in material from its companion
– Material swirling around at or near the speed of light at the
black hole’s event horizon will emit X-rays due to the extreme
temperatures
 Observing a Black Hole

• If the black hole is eclipsed by the companion, an x-ray

telescope will observe the periodic disappearance of the x-
ray signal
• From the periodicity of the X-rays and the known mass of
the companion, the mass of the invisible black hole can be
found
 Observing a Black Hole

• If this mass exceeds the maximum allowed for a

neutron star (Cygnus X-1 and A0620-00 are two
examples), a black hole is currently the only
known object that can have high mass and not be
visible (and yet its companion is)
 Hawking Radiation
• In 1974, Steven Hawking
predicted that black holes should
radiate a blackbody spectrum –
Hawking radiation
• Using Wien’s law, a solar mass
black hole will radiate with a
temperature of 6 × 10-8 K
• The net result: If left alone, a
black hole, whose only source of
energy is its mass, will eventually
“evaporate”, albeit with a very
large time scale (1067 years!)
 Chapter 16
The Milky Way Galaxy

Copyright © The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. Permission required for reproduction or display.
 The Milky Way
• The pale band of light spangled with stars
stretching across the sky is the Milky Way, a
swath of light named by the ancient Greeks
• In the 17th century, Galileo showed the Milky
Way is millions of stars too dim to see
individually
• Today we know the Milky Way is a slowly
revolving disk of stars, a galaxy
• We also know today that the Milky Way is
filled with stars of various sizes, many of them
found in clusters, and clouds of gas and dust
 Shape of the Milky Way

• Uniform distribution of stars in a band across the sky

lead Thomas Wright, Immanuel Kant, and William
Herschel in the 18th century to suggest the Milky Way
is a disc distribution of stars with the Sun near the
center
 Shape of the Milky Way

• William Herschel’s sketch of the Milky Way, from

1748. This sketch led Herschel (and others) to believe
the Milky Way was disk-shaped (correct), and that the
solar system was near the center of that disk, at the
position of the yellow dot (incorrect)
 Size of the Milky Way

• Jacobus Kapteyn determined the diameter of the Milky Way to be 20 kpc

with the Sun near the center
• Harlow Shapley found the diameter to be 100 kpc with the Sun 2/3 from
the center
• Both were not aware of the dimming effects of dust
• Shapley, using globular star clusters for distances, did not distinguish RR
Lyrae from Cepheid variables
 Size of the Milky Way
• Correcting for dust
effects and variable star
types, astronomers
conclude the disc has a
30 kpc diameter with the
Sun 2/3 from the center
• Discovery that nearly all
disc-shaped galaxies
have spiral arms implied
Milky Way is a spiral
too.
Structure and Contents of the Milky Way
• The Disk
– Spiral arms distribution
of stars, gas, and dust
with a diameter of about
30 kpc (100,000 light-
years) and plane tilted
with respect to Earth’s
orbit around Sun
– Differential rotation with
all objects circling in the
same direction: 240
million-year period at
220 km/sec at the Sun’s
orbit (about 8.5 kpc out
from center)
Structure and Contents of the Milky Way
• The Disk
– High density of stars
near center (10
million stars per
cubic light-year) to
low density farther
out (0.003 stars per
cubic light-year at
Sun)
– Dust and gas is
nearly 15% of the
disc’s mass
Structure and Contents of the Milky Way
• The Disk
– Most of galaxy is hidden
from Earth due to dust
obscuration including the
central nucleus with its
dense swarm of stars and
gas in which a massive
black hole may reside
– Radio and infrared
telescopes can “see”
entire galaxy: Radio
observations suggest
larger warped disc of gas
(out to nearly 40 kpc)
Structure and Contents of the Milky Way
• Halo
– Roughly spherical region
with disk embedded
– Contains mainly old
stars, such as globular
clusters
– Large amounts of dark
matter may also be
present
• Bulge
– Flattened collection of
stars surrounding dense
core of galaxy
– About 1/3 the diameter
of the galaxy
Mass and Population of the Milky Way

• From its rotation and effects on nearby galaxies,

mass of Milky Way is 2 × 1012 M
• From large difference between this mass and what
is observed, astronomers conclude Milky Way is
embedded in vast halo of material that emits no
radiation (at any wavelength) – dark matter
• Assuming that the average star has a mass similar to
that of the Sun, then based on the Milky Way’s
mass, there are roughly 100 billion stars
 Age of the Milky Way
• Using stellar aging techniques, astronomers had
estimated the galaxy’s most ancient stars to be
about 15 billion years old
• More recent model calculations and observations
suggests the old star ages are more like 13 billion
years
• A rough estimate of the Milky Way then is about
13 billion years
 Stars of the Milky Way

• Stellar Censuses
– Counts that list all known stars of a given type in a
region of space is called a stellar census
• All star types are represented in the Milky Way
• By analyzing the relative numbers of stars of each type,
deducing the galaxy’s history is possible
 Stars of the Milky Way
• The Mass Function
– From a stellar census one can derive the number of
stars of each mass, technically known as the mass
function
• Mass determines the life cycle of a star
• The evolution of the Milky Way will then depend on:
– How many stars of each type it contains (A galaxy with only
massive stars will evolve quickly)
– How fast each type is created (Fast creation will quickly deplete
gas resources)
 Stars of the Milky Way
• Some results:
– Dividing the number of stars in the Milky Way by its age gives
a star creation rate of 3-5 stars per year
– Most numerous stars turn out to be dim, cool, red dwarfs (mass
about 0.5 M)
– The average mass for Milky Way stars is ~1 M
– Stars more massive than 100 M are rare
– Current research suggests that brown dwarfs (“failed stars” of
mass less than 0.08 M) are more numerous than ordinary stars
– It is important to be aware of “selection effects” when
interpreting data: “Absence of evidence is not evidence of
absence”; i.e., there may be things there you cannot see)
 Two Stellar Populations
• Population I
– Age: generally young
(106 to a few times
109) years
– Color: blue (generally)
– Location: disk and
concentrated in arms
– Orbit: approximately
circular in disk
– Heavy-element
content: high (similar
to Sun)
 Two Stellar Populations
• Population II
– Age: old (about 1010)
years
– Color: red
– Location: halo and
bulge
– Orbit: plunging
through disk
– Heavy-element
content: low (10-2 to
10-3 Sun)
 Two Stellar Populations
• Division of stars into
two groups can be
oversimplification
– Sun does not fit in either
category, but is usually
considered a Pop I star
– Inspires creating sub-
groups
• Subdivide each
population into extreme
and intermediate
• Old-disk population
sometimes used for stars
like the Sun
 Two Stellar Populations
• The two populations
show that star formation
has not occurred
continuously
– Pop II formed in major
burst at galaxy’s birth
during its initial collapse
– Pop I formed much later
and are still forming
today
• Pop I stars used to map
spiral arms in vicinity
around Sun
 Star Clusters

• Some of the Milky Way’s • There are two types of star

stars are gravitationally clusters
bound together in groups – Open Clusters
called star clusters – Globular Clusters
 Open Clusters
• Contain up to a few hundred members in a volume of
typically 7-20 light-years across
• Pleiades (or the Seven Sisters) is an excellent example
• Also called “galactic clusters” since most lie in galactic
disk
• Formed when interstellar gas clouds are compressed
and collapse upon entering the Milky Way’s spiral arm
• About 20,000 open clusters currently exist, many of
them obscured by the dust of the galactic disk
 Open Clusters

• Within spiral arms, very young stars may group

together in loose associations a few hundred
light-years across
– Single large open cluster near their center
– Birthing gas and dust still present
• After hundreds of millions of years, the stars
gradually leave and the cluster dissipates
Open Clusters
 Globular Clusters

• Contain far more stars than open clusters,

from a few hundred thousand to several
million per cluster
• Have large radii, 40-60 light-years across
• The strong gravity pulls the stars into a ball
denser than that found in open stars
• About 150-200 globular clusters outline the
halo and bulge of the Milky Way
Globular Clusters
 Star Clusters
• Open and globular
clusters reflect the
properties of Pop I
and II stars – Open
clusters are generally
Pop I and globular
clusters are always
Pop II
Gas and Dust in the Milky Way
• The space between stars is
not empty: it contains
interstellar matter
composed of gas and dust
– Most of the gas and dust
exists in the galactic plane
– Even here it clumps into
clouds a few light-years to a
few hundred light-years
across
– Typical densities are a few
gas atoms per cubic
centimeter (air has 1019
atoms per cubic centimeter
 Gas and Dust in the Milky Way
• Interstellar clouds seen
directly or detected by
their effect on light from
distant stars
– Gas and dust imprint
narrow absorption lines on
starlight passing through
interstellar clouds: such
lines can give cloud’s – Dust is m to nm in size,
composition, temperature, made of silicates and
density, and speed carbon compounds, and
– Gas found to be 71% H, perhaps coated with ices
of water, carbon
27% He, 2% heavy
monoxide, and methyl
elements
alcohol
Scattering
• The light from a star
dims and reddens as it
passes through an
interstellar cloud with
dust
• Light is randomly
reflected from the
dust surfaces in a
process called
scattering
 Scattering
• This scattering is most
effective when the
light’s wavelength is
smaller than the dust
grain
• The optimum
scattering for
interstellar dust and
molecules in the
Earth’s atmosphere is • Earth’s sky is blue and the
for blue and ultraviolet setting Sun red because of
light scattering
Reddening
• The loss of blue
light from a star due
to scattering in an
intervening cloud is
called reddening
• An interstellar cloud
that completely
obscures the stars
behind it is called a
dark nebula
 Reddening and Obscuration

• The large amount of dust in the galactic plane reduces almost to

zero the number of distant galaxies that can be seen – this region
of the sky is called the zone of avoidance (the galaxies can still
be “seen” in the radio and infrared)
 Reflection Nebula

• A nebula may be seen in the visible as the result of starlight

reflecting off the dust – such a nebula is called a reflection
nebula
 Interstellar Gas
• Interstellar gas plays a crucial
role in providing material for
creating stars and a repository
for matter blown out by dying
stars
• Interstellar gas also helps
astronomers map the Milky
Way since molecules within
the clouds emit at
wavelengths that can
penetrate dust
• And, of course, the visible
wavelengths of many gas
clouds provide spectacular
images
Interstellar Gas
• Interstellar gas clouds
that emit visible light
are called emission
nebulas
– To emit this light, the
cloud must have a
source of energy,
usually a nearby star
– Hot, blue stars are
especially effective at
energizing a gas
cloud
Interstellar Gas
• Clouds that are hot
enough to ionize
hydrogen will give
off a very
characteristic red
color as electrons
recombine with
protons – these
clouds are called HII
regions (the II
indicating ionization)
Interstellar Gas
• Maps of radio and
optical
observations of
HII regions are the
best evidence we
have that the
Milky Way is a
spiral galaxy
 Mapping the Milky Way
• Most interstellar gas
clouds are too remote
from hot stars to be seen
in the visible
– We detect these clouds by
measuring their radio
output
– For hydrogen, the 21-
centimeter radiation is the
radio emission that comes
from the “spin flip” of the
bound electron
 Mapping the Milky Way
• Radio emissions are not only
valuable for mapping gas
distributions in the galaxy, but
also for identifying the types
of molecules that exist in
space
– Examples: H2 (molecular
hydrogen), OH (hydroxyl
radical), CN (cyanogen radical),
CO (carbon monoxide), H2O
(water), NH3 (ammonia),
HCOH, (formaldehyde),
HCOOH (formic acid),
CH3CH2OH (ethyl alcohol or
ethanol)
 Spiral Arm Models
• Density-wave model
– Stars travel around the center of the galaxy in their own orbits
– Stars and gas traveling in the disc will bunch up as they enter an
arm and will spread out as they leave
– This bunching is similar to that of cars on a freeway except gravity
causes the bunching of the stars
– Gas entering the arm is compressed initiating star formation
– The newly created and very luminous O and B stars illuminate the
gas and dust in the arms
– Having very small lifetimes, the O and B stars die before leaving
the arm region thus making the spiral arms more conspicuous than
surrounding regions
– Theory has difficult time explaining longevity of spiral arms, but
observed aging of O and B stars across the arms is consistent with
the theory
Density-Wave Model

RPU
Insert Figure 16.19 here
 Spiral Arm Models
• Self-propagating star formation model
– This theory proposed to explain ragged-appearing arms of some
galaxies
– Star formation begins at some random location in the galaxy
creating a collection of stars
– As these stars heat the gas around them and the larger ones
explode, the disturbance sets off a star formation in an adjoining
gas cloud
– The process continues as long as there are enough large stars and
gas to propagate the star formation process
– Differential rotation of the galaxy then spreads the stars out into a
spiral arm
– The random nature of the triggering star formation should give a
spiral galaxy a ragged look and this is observed in some galaxies
Self-Propagating Star Formation
 Diameter of the Milky Way
• All methods to determine the Milky Way’s
diameter depend on Sun’s distance to center
• Red giant maser method
– Red giant maser radio sources common in inner bulge
– Stars near galactic center move in random directions
– Assume in a given volume a star moving radially has
the same speed as one moving across the line of sight
– Use Doppler shift of radial maser source to determine
speed and use this with transverse maser angular
motion to determine distance
– Geometric center of masers gives Sun distance of 7 kpc
 Diameter of the Milky Way
• Globular cluster method
– Globular cluster
distances and directions
determined using period-
luminosity relation for
variable stars
– Geometric center of
globulars then marks the
center
– Distance to center from
Sun is then found to be
8.5 kpc
 Diameter of the Milky Way
• Once distance to
center from Sun
found, this is added
to distance to outer
edge from Sun to
arrive at the Milky
Way’s diameter – a
value of about 40
kpc or more
 Mass of the Milky Way

• The mass of the Milky Way is determined by using Kepler’s

modified third law
• Using the Sun’s distance to the center and its period of
revolution, the mass interior to the Sun’s orbit is at least 1011
M
 Mass of the Milky Way

• A more refined technique uses the rotation speeds of stars at a

variety of distances from the center (the so-called rotation
curve)
• This technique can more accurately determine the mass of the
entire galaxy – the Sun method only estimates the mass interior
to its orbit
 Mass of the Milky Way

• In either method, the speed of stars around the galaxy

is crucial and there are many ways to do this – two of
them are:
– Use the Local Group of galaxies as a reference frame since
the stars on the Milky Way move much faster
– Use the distribution of randomly moving globular clusters as
on average being at rest
• Analysis of the rotation curve also reveals a dark
matter halo with a radius exceeding 100 kpc
 The Galactic Center

• Because the galactic center is not observable in

the visible, astronomers must rely on radio,
infrared, X-ray, and gamma-ray observations
 The Galactic Center
• At a distance of 3 kpc, an arc of cold hydrogen sweeps
outward at a speed exceeding 100 km/sec
• A giant swarm of stars, packed in at millions of stars
per cubic light-year, are arranged in an elongated
structure about 1000 light-years across
• Some energetic event, perhaps a supernova explosion,
violently disturbed the center in the not-to-distant past
• Deep within the core lies an incredibly small (10 AU
diameter) radio source known as Sgr A*
• A 5 ×106 M black hole may occupy the very center of
the galaxy!
A Black Hole?
 Formation of the Milky Way
• Forming galaxies is still a major unsolved
problem
• Originally, it was thought that galaxies form
like stars, but only on a larger scale
– Begin with a million-light-year cloud with 100
billion solar masses of material
– The cloud gravitationally collapses and breaks up
into stars
• Evidence for this galaxy formation process
can be found in the Pop I and Pop II stars
Formation of the Milky Way
Formation of the Milky Way

• The proto-Milky Way

was a giant cloud of pure
hydrogen and helium
• The existence of old Pop
II stars with very little
heavy elements suggests
they formed at the onset
of collapse and as they
did so, they dropped out
of the gas collapse
Formation of the Milky Way
• The massive Pop II stars
exploded early on,
seeding the galactic cloud
with heavy elements
• By the time the cloud
collapsed into a disc it
was rich enough in heavy
elements to generate the
Pop I stars we see there
today
Formation of the Milky Way
Computer Simulation of Galactic Formation
 Formation of the Milky Way

• However, the collapse model fails to explain two

important properties of stars
– Pop II stars appear to have formed over a longer time
scale than the collapse model allows
– Some stars should have virtually no heavy elements,
but no such stars have ever been observed
 Formation of the Milky Way

• Today, astronomers also think the collapse model fails

to include the effects of galactic mergers on galactic and
stellar evolution – merging appears to be the rule, not
the exception
 Population III Stars
• Despite uncertainties, the basic idea of the initial
stars being made of pure hydrogen and helium is
still true – so where are they
• These population III stars may not be observable
for three reasons
– Only short-lived massive population III stars can
form – consequently none are left today
– Population III stars exist, but are masquerading as
Pop II since their atmospheres have been
contaminated by gas ejected when a more massive
star exploded
– Pop II stars may be rare and hard to find
 The Future of the Milky Way
• Eventually all gas finds
its way into stars,
which in turn will lock
up material in stellar
remnants
• Hundreds of billions of
years from now the
Milky Way will fade,
slowly spinning in
space, a dark disk of
stellar cinders
 Chapter 17
Galaxies

Copyright © The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. Permission required for reproduction or display.
 Galaxies
• Beyond the Milky Way are billions of other galaxies
• Some galaxies are spiral like the Milky Way while
others are egg-shaped or completely irregular in
appearance
• Besides shape, galaxies vary greatly in the star, gas, and
dust content and some are more “active” than others
• Galaxies tend to cluster together and these clusters
appear to be separating from each other, caught up in a
Universe that is expanding
• The reason for all this diversity is as yet unanswered
 Galaxies
• A galaxy is an
immense and relatively
isolated cloud of
hundreds of millions to
hundreds of billions of
stars, and vast clouds of
interstellar gas
• Each star moves in its
own orbit guided by the
gravity generated by
other stars in the galaxy
 Early Observations of Galaxies
• Since galaxies are so far
away, only a few can be
seen without the aid of a
telescope: Andromeda and
the Large and Small
Magellanic Clouds
• In 18th century, Charles
Messier cataloged several
“fuzzy” objects to be
avoided in comet searches –
many turned out to be
galaxies (M31 =
Andromeda)
 Early Observations of Galaxies

• In 19th century, William Hershel and others systematically

mapped the heavens creating the New General Catalog
(NGC) which included many galaxies (M82 = NGC 3034)
 Types of Galaxies

• By the 1920s, Edwin Hubble demonstrated that galaxies

could be divided on the basis of their shape into three types,
and two sub-types
Spiral Galaxies
• Two or more arms
winding out from
center
• Classified with letter
S followed by a
letter (a-d) to
distinguish how
large the nucleus is
and/or how wound
up the arms are
 Elliptical Galaxies

• Smooth and featureless appearance and a

generally elliptical shape
• Classified with letter E followed by a number
(0-7) to express “flatness” of elliptical shape
Learning the Hubble Classification Scheme
 Irregular Galaxies

• Neither arms or uniform appearance - generally, stars

and gas clouds scattered in random patches
• Classified as Irr
 Barred Spirals
• Arms emerge from ends of
elongated central region or bar
rather than core of galaxy
• Classified with letters SB
followed by the letters (a-d)
• Thought by Hubble to be a
separate class of object from
normal S spirals, computer
simulations show bar may be
result of a close encounter
between two galaxies
• The Milky Way is probably an
SB galaxy
 S0 Galaxies
• Disk systems with
no evidence of arms
• Thought by Hubble
to be intermediate
between S and E
galaxies, several
theories now vie to
explain their
appearance (e.g., an
S0 lacks gas to
produce O and B
stars to light up any
spiral arms that may
exist)
The Hubble “Tuning Fork”
 Galaxy Distances
• Galaxy distances are too
far to employ the
parallax technique
• The method of
“standard candles” is
used
• The standard candles
are usually Cepheid
variables, supergiant
stars, planetary nebulas,
supernovas, etc.
 Galaxy Distances
• Two other useful methods
– Image “graininess” – The
smoother the distribution
of stars in a galaxy the
farther away it is
– Tully-Fisher Method – The
higher the rotational speed
of a galaxy, the more
luminous it is
– The interrelationship of all
the distance measuring
methods is called the
distance ladder
Measuring the Diameter of Galaxies
• Astronomers measure a
galaxy’s diameter (d) using a
standard geometric formula
• where A is the angular size
of the galaxy on the sky (in
degrees) and D is the
distance to the galaxy
• To use the equation, A must
be measured and D must be
determined by a standard
candle technique or from the
Hubble law
 The Hubble Law
• In 1911, it was discovered
that all galaxies (with but a
few exceptions) were
moving away from the
Milky Way
• Edwin Hubble found that
these radial speeds, RPU
Insert Figure 17.18a here
calculated by a Doppler shift
analysis and called a
recession velocity, increased
with a galaxy’s distance
 The Hubble Law
• From a plot of several
galaxies’ known
recessional velocities (V)
and distances (D), Edwin
Hubble, in 1920,
discovered a simple
formula:
RPU
V  H D Insert Figure 17.18b here
• Today, this expression is
called the Hubble law
and H is called the
Hubble constant
 The Hubble Law
• Although not completely
agreed upon, H is about
70 km/sec/Mpc (Mpc =
megaparsecs)
• With H known, one can
turn this around and RPU
determine a galaxy’s Insert Figure 17.18b here
unknown distance by
measuring its recessional
velocity and assuming a
value for H
 Limitations of Hubble’s Law
• Galaxies and other objects
may have motions that have
nothing to do with the
expansion of space
• When galaxies orbit each
other, sometimes their orbital
speed is much larger than the
redshift caused by
expansion.
• We cannot use Hubble’s law
for nearby galaxies, and
certainly not for any objects
orbiting inside our own
Galaxy.
 The Cause of Galaxy Types
• Computer simulations show galaxies formed from gas
clouds with large random motions becoming
ellipticals, whereas small random motions become
spirals
• Ellipticals had a high star formation rate in a brief
period after their birth, while spirals produce stars over
a longer period – did the rate cause the type of the
reverse?
• Dark matter halo spin rate – fast for spirals, slow for
ellipticals
• Density wave or SSF model for creating spiral arms
 Galactic Collisions and Mergers

• Could galaxy’s type change with time?

– Computer simulations show a galaxy’s shape can change
dramatically during a close encounter with another galaxy
 Consequences of a Collision

• Individual stars are left unharmed

• Gas/dust clouds collide triggering a burst of star formation
• A small galaxy may alter the stellar orbits of a large spiral
to create a “ring galaxy”
• Evidence (faint shell-like rings and dense clumps of stars)
of spirals colliding and merging into ellipticals
Stellar and Gas Content of Galaxies
• Spirals
– Star types: Mix of Pop I and Pop II
– Interstellar content: 15% by mass in
disk
• Ellipticals
– Star types: Only Pop II, blue stars
rare
– Interstellar content: Very low
density, very hot gas
• Irregulars
– Star types: blue stars common
– Interstellar content: As much as
50% by mass
Stellar and Gas Content of Galaxies
• Other items of note:
– Ellipticals have a large range of sizes from globular
cluster sizes to 100 times the mass of the Milky Way
– Census of galaxies nearby: Most are dim dwarf E and
dwarf Irr sparsely populated with stars
– Census of distant galaxies: In clusters, 60% of
members are spirals and S0, while in sparsely
populated regions it is 80%
– Early (very young) galaxies are much smaller than
Milky Way – merging of these small galaxies is
thought to have resulted in the larger galaxies of
today
 Galactic Collisions and Mergers

• Evidence for galaxy type change via

collisions/mergers over time
– On a large scale, small galaxies may be captured and
absorbed by a large galaxy in a process called galactic
cannibalism
• Explains abnormally large ellipticals in center of some galaxy
clusters
• Milky Way appears to be “swallowing” the Magellanic Clouds,
while Andromeda shows rings and star clumps of “swallowed”
galaxies
 Galactic Collisions and Mergers
• Evidence for galaxy change type via
collisions/mergers over time
– Very distant clusters have a higher proportion of
spirals than near clusters
– Distant clusters contain more galaxies within a
given volume
– Distant galaxies show more signs of disturbance
by neighboring galaxies (odd shapes, bent arms,
twisted disks), what astronomers call
“harassment”
Galactic Evolution

RPU
Insert Figure 17.16 here
 Active Galaxies
• Centers (nuclei) emit abnormally large amounts
of energy from a tiny region in their core
• Emitted radiation usually fluctuates
• In many instances intense radio emission and
other activity exists well outside the galaxy
• Centers of active galaxies referred to as AGNs –
active galactic nuclei
• 10% of all galaxies are active
• Three overlapping classes: radio galaxies,
Seyfert galaxies, and quasars
Seyfert Galaxies
• Spiral galaxies (mostly)
with abnormally luminous
nucleus
– As much energy output as the
entire Milky Way
– Region of emission is less
than a light-year across
– Wavelength emissions range
from infrared to X-ray
– Intensity fluctuates rapidly,
sometimes changing in a few
minutes
Seyfert Galaxies
• Contain gas clouds
moving at high speed
– Occasionally the gas is
ejected in small jets
• Rapidly moving gas and
small, bright nucleus
make Seyfert galaxies
similar to radio galaxies,
and , in fact, some
Seyfert galaxies are
radio galaxies as well
 Radio Galaxies
• Generally elliptical
galaxies
• Emit radio energy
– Energy comes from core
and regions symmetrically
located outside of galaxy
• Outside regions are called
“radio lobes” and span
hundreds of millions of Lobes can be swept into
light-years arcs or plumes as they
• Core source is less than a interact with
light-month across intergalactic matter
 Radio Galaxies
• Energy is as much
as 1 million times – High-speed electrons
more than normal eventually collide with
galaxies surrounding gas and
spread out to form lobes
• Radio emission is
synchrotron
radiation
– High-speed
electrons are
generated in core
and shot out via jets
in general direction
of the lobes
 Quasars
• Largest redshifts of any
astronomical object
– Hubble law implies they
are at great distances (as
much as 10 billion light-
years away)
– To be visible at those
distances, they must be
about 1000× more
luminous than the Milky
Way
 Quasars
• Some similar to radio
galaxies in emissions
• Others similar to
radio and Seyfert
galaxies in that they
eject hot gas from
their centers
• Superluminal motion
in jets indicate
extreme high-speed
motions
 Quasars
• Recent images reveal
quasars often lie in faint,
fuzzy-looking objects
that appear to be ordinary
galaxies
• Based on output
fluctuations, quasars
resemble the AGNs of
radio galaxies and
Seyfert galaxies in that
they are small (fractions
of a light-year in some
cases)
 Cause of Activity in Galaxies
• All active galaxies have many features in
common – this suggests a single model to
explain all of them
– Such a model must explain how a small region
can emit an extreme amount of energy over a
broad range of wavelengths
– Model must be unusual since no ordinary star
could be so luminous nor could enough ordinary
stars be packed into such a small volume
 Cause of Activity in Galaxies
• Basic model
– Black hole about the size
of the Earth with a gas
accretion disc tens to
hundreds of AU across
– Most gas drawn into
black hole heats to
millions K
– Some gas channeled by
magnetic fields into jets
– Accretion gas replenished
by nearby passing stars or
material from collision
with another galaxy
 Cause of Activity In Galaxies
• Creation of massive black hole
– Massive star in densely populated core of galaxy
explodes forming a small black hole of ~5 M
– Black hole grows from accretion of interstellar
matter
– Radius of black hole increases making capture of
more material easier
– Eventually black hole becomes large enough to
swallow entire stars
– Growth of black hole is exponential until
equilibrium with available materials stops
growth
 Cause of Activity In Galaxies
– Observational “proof” – extremely high speeds of gas
and stars at very small distance from galactic center
requires huge mass there (at least millions of solar
masses), yet this mass emits no radiation of its own
– All galaxies appear to have massive black holes at their
centers
– Not all galaxies are active, especially older ones,
because central source of material to black hole is
diminished
– Highly correlated relationship of central black hole mass
to bulge size suggests that they grow at the same rate
– Other theories of AGNs exist, but none is as well
accepted as the black hole model
Quasars as Probes of Intergalactic Space
• The immense distances of
quasars allow their light to
be used as probes of the
intervening material
– Quasar absorption lines
have very different Doppler
shifts from the emission
RPU
lines of the quasars
Insert Figure 17.30 here
themselves – an indicator
of cool gas clouds between
the quasar and Earth
– A quasar’s light may be
affected by a gravitational
lens
 Galaxy Clusters

• Galaxies are often found in groupings called

galaxy clusters
– Galaxies within these clusters are held together by their
mutual gravity
– Typical cluster is several million light-years across and
contains a handful to several thousand galaxies
 The Local Group
• The Milky Way belongs to a very small cluster
called the Local Group
• The Local Group contains about 30 members with
the 3 largest members being the spiral galaxies
M31, M33, and the Milky Way
• Most of the Local Group galaxies are faint, small
“dwarf” galaxies - ragged, disorganized collection
of stars with very little or no gas – that can’t be
seen in other clusters
The Local Group
 Large Clusters

• Largest groups of galaxies - contain hundreds to

thousands of member galaxies
• Large gravity puts galaxies into spherical distribution
• Contain mainly elliptical and S0 galaxies
• Spirals tend to be on fringes of cluster
• Giant ellipticals tend to be near center – cannibalism
• Contain large amounts (1012 to 1014 M) of extremely
hot X-ray emitting gas with very little heavy elements
The Hercules Cluster
 Small Clusters (Groups)

• Only a dozen or so
member galaxies
• Ragged, irregular
look
• High proportion of
spirals and
irregulars
 Galaxy Clusters
• In general, all clusters need dark matter to
explain galactic motions and the confinement
of hot intergalactic gas within cluster
• Near clusters appear to have their members
fairly smoothly spread out, while far away
clusters (and hence younger clusters) are
more ragged looking – this suggests that
clusters form by galaxies attracting each
other into groups as opposed to clustering
forming out of a giant gas cloud
 Superclusters
• A group of galaxy clusters may gravitationally
attract each other into a larger structure called a
supercluster – a cluster of clusters
– A supercluster contains a half dozen to several
dozen galaxy clusters spread over tens to hundreds
of millions of light-years (The Local group belongs
to the Local Supercluster)
– Superclusters have irregular shapes and are
themselves part of yet larger groups (e.g., the “Great
Wall” and the “Great Attractor”)
The Local Supercluster
 The Structure of the Universe
• Superclusters
appear to form
chains and shells
surrounding
regions nearly
empty of galaxies
– voids
• Clusters of
superclusters and
voids mark the end
of the Universe’s
structure we
currently see
 Measuring the Mass of Galaxies
• The mass of a galaxy is determined from the modified
form of Kepler’s third law
• To use this method, one concentrates on some stars or
gas on the outer fringes of the galaxy
• The semimajor axis distance used in Kepler’s third law
is simply half the galaxy’s pre-determined diameter
• For the orbital period used in the third law, one uses
Doppler analysis of the galaxy’s spectral lines to
determine orbital speed and this speed used with the
galaxy’s diameter gives the period
 Dark Matter
• Dark matter is the
material predicted to
account for the
discrepancy between
the mass of a galaxy
as found from the
modified Kepler’s
third law and the
mass observed in the
form of gas and dust
 Dark Matter
• The amount of matter
needed to resolve this
discrepancy is as much as
10× the visible mass
• The strongest evidence
that dark matter exists
comes from galaxy
rotation curves, which do
not show diminishing
speeds at large distances
from the galaxy’s center
 Dark Matter Candidates
• Dark matter cannot be:
– Ordinary dim stars because they would show up in infrared
images
– Cold gas because this gas would be detectable at radio
wavelengths
– Hot gas would be detectable in the optical, radio, and x-ray
regions of the spectrum
• Objects that cannot be ruled out:
– Tiny planetesimal-sized bodies, extremely low-mass cool
stars, dead white dwarfs, neutron stars, and black holes
(MACHOs)
– Subatomic particles like neutrinos
– Theoretically predicted, but not yet observed, particles referred
to as WIMPs (weakly interacting massive particles)
MACHOs and Gravitational Lenses
 Gravitational Lenses
• Light from a quasar may
bend as it passes by a
massive object in much the
same way light is bent as it
passes through a glass lens
• The bending of light by
gravity is a prediction of
Einstein’s general theory of
relativity
• The bending light creates
multiple quasar images and
arcs that can be used to
determine the mass of the
massive object
 Chapter 18
Cosmology

Copyright © The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. Permission required for reproduction or display.
 Cosmology
• Cosmology is the
study of the structure
and evolution of the
Universe as a whole
– How big is the
Universe?
– What shape is it?
– How old is it?
– How did it form?
– What will happen in
the future?
 Cosmology
• What we seem to know
now:
– The Universe is
expanding and is filled
with a very low-energy
background radiation
– The radiation and
expansion imply the
Universe began some
13.7 billion years ago
– The Universe began as a
hot, dense, violent burst
of matter and energy
called the Big Bang
 Observations of the Universe
• In the early years of the 20th
century, astronomers
envisioned the Universe as a
static place with only the
Milky Way and a few
companions
• It was not until the 1920s that
astronomers realized the
Universe was filled with other
galaxies millions of light-
years apart and that the
Universe was expanding
 Observations of the Universe
• No matter which way you
look (ignoring the zone of
avoidance), you see about the
same number of galaxies
• The galaxies are not spread
smoothly, but clump into
groups
• This “smooth clumping”
implies a similar distribution
for the whole Universe
(contrast this with the sky’s
Milky Way implying a disc-
shaped galaxy)
 Motion of Galaxies
• In general, a galaxy obeys the
Hubble law: speed of recession
is proportional to the galaxy’s
distance, the proportionality
given by the Hubble constant
• The motion away is due to the
expansion of space itself – not
like bomb fragments going
through the air, but like buttons
attached to an expanding
balloon
Age of the Universe
• Running the Universe’s
expansion backward implies
all mass becomes confined
into a very small volume,
what was once called the
“Primeval Atom”
• Assuming galaxies have
always moved with the
velocities they now have,
the Hubble Law gives age
for Universe of 14 billion
years with H = 70 km/s/Mpc
 Are We at the Center of the Universe?

• The recession of distant galaxies often leads to the misconception

that the Milky Way is the Universe’s center
• However, because space is expanding, no matter where you are
located, galaxies will move away from you – there is no preferred
center
• This lack of a preferred location is called the cosmological principle
 Olbers’s Paradox
• In 1823, Heinrich Olbers
offered Olbers’s Paradox:
If the Universe extends
forever and has existed
forever, the night sky
should be bright – but of
course it isn’t
• Olbers reasoned that no
matter which direction
you looked in the sky a
star’s light should be seen
 Olbers’s Paradox
• Resolution: Finite
age and speed of
light means only a
finite volume of
starlight is
available – the
night sky is dark
 The Cosmic Horizon
• The age of the Universe
limits the distance we can
see since the speed of light
is finite
• In a static Universe, this
distance is directly
determined from its age
and the speed of light
• The maximum distance
one can see (in principal,
but not necessarily in
practice) is called the
cosmic horizon
 The Cosmic Horizon
• The space
within the
horizon is called
the visible (or
observable)
Universe – there
may very well
be more to the
Universe
beyond
 The Size of the Universe
• The distance to the
cosmic horizon
gives a rough
measure of the
radius of the
(visible) Universe
• For a 14 billion-
year-old Universe,
this radius is 14
billion light-years
The Cosmic Microwave Background
• The proposed very-dense early Universe
implied that it must have been very hot, perhaps
10 trillion K
• It was proposed that as the Universe expanded
and cooled, the radiation that existed at that
early time would survive to the present as
microwave radiation
• This radiation was accidentally discovered by
Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson in 1965 and
has since then been referred to as the cosmic
microwave background (CMB)
“Stretching” Radiation
The Cosmic Microwave Background
• The CMB
follows a
perfect
blackbody
spectrum with
a temperature
of 2.725 K
(about 3 K, a
bit above
absolute zero)
 Composition of the Oldest Stars
• Current theory suggests that the early Universe
consisted of protons, neutrons, and electrons
• The initial hot and dense state allowed nuclear
reactions to create helium
• Based on estimates of the early Universe’s
expansion rate, about 24% of the matter should be
transformed to helium – in good agreement with
what is observed in old stars in the Milky Way
and other galaxies
• Similar measurement of deuterium (2H) and
lithium also support the hot, dense early Universe
idea
 Evolution of the Universe

• The Universe is currently expanding, but what of its future:

– Will it expand forever
– Will it stop expanding and collapse
 Evolution of the Universe
• Expanding forever means that as all the stars
consume their hydrogen, the Universe will
become black and empty – this scenario is the
open universe
• A Universe that collapses as a “Big Crunch”
might lead to another “Primeval Atom”, leading
perhaps to the birth of another universe – this
scenario is the closed universe
• The expansion speed of the Universe becomes
zero when the Universe has reached infinite size
– this scenario is the flat universe
 Evolution of the Universe
• The energy content of the Universe depends on
what type of universe we are in
– An open universe has positive total energy
– A flat universe has zero total energy
– A closed universe has negative total energy
– In principal, if we measure the energy content of the
Universe, we can tell what type it is
– The energy content of the Universe is the sum of its
positive kinetic energy of expansion and its negative
energy of gravitational binding (basically its mass
content
 The Density of the Universe

• The mass density of the Universe gives an equivalent

means of determining its total energy content and it’s
easier to measure
 The Density of the Universe
• To determine if the Universe is open or closed,
compare its density () to the critical density:
2
3H
c 
8 G
• Here H is Hubble constant and G is the
gravitational constant
• If  > c, the Universe is closed
• If  < c, the Universe is open
 The Density of the Universe
• The critical density is 10-29 g/cm3, about one
hydrogen atom per cubic meter and this is about
25 times more than the mass density determined
from observed stars and gas

– Based on the amount of observed mass, the Universe

looks open
– But if dark matter is included, the total density of the
Universe is 3 × 10-30 g/cm3, almost enough to close
the Universe, but not quite!
 A Cosmological Repulsion?

RPU
Insert Figure 18.12 here

• Another way to ascertain the Universe’s fate is to look at very

distant galaxies – galaxies in the past – to see how fast the
Universe’s expansion has slowed
• Interestingly, using supernova in very far and faint galaxies
as distance indicators, it appears the Universe is speeding up,
not slowing down
 A Cosmological Repulsion?

• How is this possible?

– Einstein’s general relativity equations include a cosmological
constant that represents a repulsive force
– When the expansion of the Universe was discovered, the
cosmological constant was thought to be zero
– Latest measurements imply this may not be the case
– The additional expansion energy is called dark energy, and is
a property of space itself.
– This dark energy contributes to the total mass of the Universe,
bringing its density up to the critical density!
 The Curvature of the Universe

• Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity is

built around the curved space
– Curved space is not easy to visualize, but there
are two-dimensional models that can help
 Positive Curvature

• Positive curvature
(also called
“closed”)
resembles the
surface of a sphere
– parallel lines
meet, and triangles
have interior
angles with a sum
greater than 180°
 Negative Curvature

• Negative curvature
(also called “open”)
resembles the
surface of a saddle –
parallel lines never
meet, and triangles
have interior angles
with a sum less than
180°
 Flat Curvature

• Flat curvature
(what people
typically think of
as space) – parallel
lines do not meet,
and triangles have
interior angles
with a sum equal
to 180°
Measuring the Curvature of Space

• In principle one could directly measure the interior

angles of a triangle or an equivalent geometric
arrangement, but to date, practical limitations
prevent it
 Measuring the Curvature of Space

• CMB provides another way

– CMB is extremely uniform across the sky except for tiny
variations in brightness from place to place
 Measuring the Curvature of Space

• The spatial sizes of these variations can be predicted

based on conditions in the early Universe
• Analysis of variations indicate that Universe is flat
with a non-zero cosmological constant
 Makeup of the Universe

RPU
Insert Figure 18.16 here

Based on observation of temperature fluctuations in the Cosmic

Microwave Background, we can estimate the mass content of
the Universe
 The Origin of the Universe

• The early Universe’s high temperature and

density imply that it may have had a very
simple structure
– Mass and radiation mingled in a manner unlike
their sharp distinction today
– Radiation is so energetic that it easily
transforms to mass – mass and radiation
behaved as a single entity
 Radiation, Matter, and
Antimatter
• E = mc2 tells us not only
can mass be transformed to
energy (as in stars), but that
energy (in photons) can be
transformed into mass
– The creation of mass,
however, must come in pairs,
ordinary matter, and
antimatter
– The antiparticle of the
electron is the positron, the
antiparticle of the proton is
the antiproton
 History of the Universe
• At one microsecond after the Big Bang
– Temperature 1013 K, hot enough for photons
to create quarks and antiquarks
– Diameter smaller than Earth’s orbit
– Universe expands at near speed of light and
cools
– Lower temperature no longer produces
quarks/antiquarks
– Subatomic physics dictates that existing
quarks/antiquarks annihilate asymmetrically
leaving an excess of quarks
– Surviving quarks combine into protons,
neutrons
 History of the Universe

• After 5 seconds
or so, the
Universe cools
enough for the
creation of matter
to cease
 History of the Universe

• At 3 minutes
after the Big
Bang
– Temperature is a
few hundred
million degrees
– 1/4 of protons
fuse into helium
 History of the Universe
• Next half million years
– Further expansion and
cooling
– Electrons begin to bind
to protons to make
hydrogen molecules (this
is referred to as the
recombination era)
– At end of period,
photons and matter go
their separate ways
 History of the Universe
• Considering ages of
several galaxies,
galaxy formation had
to start soon after
recombination era
• Protogalaxies formed
from gravitational
collapse of gas
clouds
 Formation of Galaxies
• Gravity too feeble to create galaxies
in time scales needed
• Need for dark matter to speed things
up
• Dark matter forms clumps around
which the protogalaxies form
– Areas rich in dark matter clumps form
large scale galaxy chains and sheets
– Area depleted in a dark matter form
voids
History of the Universe
 The Inflationary Universe
• What was the state of the Universe before one
microsecond?
– Universe was even hotter and denser
– Universe was smaller than the size of a proton
– Gravity is no longer a force of attraction, but one of
repulsion
– This repulsive force creates a violent explosion,
which cosmologists call inflation
• Began about 10-35 seconds and lasted 10-32 seconds
• Inflationary period ends where the previous Big Bang
ideas begin
 The Inflationary Universe
• The inflationary models of the
universe mark the frontier of our
understanding of the cosmos and give
tentative answers to several unsolved
mysteries
– Some models suggest creation from
nothing
– Others suggest existence of other
separate universe
– Still others posit that the Universe has
10 or 11 dimensions
– Finally, these models also try to explain
why space is so flat, and how all the
forces of nature relate to one another