Tour of the Universe
Name all 4 terrestrial planets in our solar system in order starting with the closest to the sun.
Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars
The point directly above you in the celestial sky is known as the...
Zenyth
The two main types of optical telescopes are...
Reflective and refractive
What fundamental property of light does astronomical spectroscopy primarily measure?
Before SalsaJ can be installed, we have to make sure that we have what other software installed to run it?
JAVA
Name all 4 Jovial planets in our solar system in order starting with closest to the sun.
Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune
Name 1 of the many important things that early humans used the celestial sphere for.
Navigation, Agriculture, Calendars, Theology...
A telescope's main job is to "catch" as many photons as possible. The bigger the _____________ of the telescope, the better.
Aperture
Which type of spectrum is produced by light passing through a cool, diffuse gas?
Absorption spectrum
By clicking on a star on Stellarium we can view it's MAGNITUDE. Would an average, casual observer looking up without any tools be able to see a star with a magnitude of 4?
Yes (6 and under - even in the negatives)
Our solar system is part of what galaxy?
Milky Way
The hypothetical line that represents the plane of our solar system and on which all planets and the sun revolve is known as the...
The ecliptic
This instrument is used to help point the main telescope at the specific area of the sky you want to observe.
Finder Scope or View finder
Wien’s Law relates the wavelength at which a star gives off the greatest amount of energy to the star’s
Temperature
If it is daytime in Stellarium but you want to see the stars, what could you switch off?
Atmosphere
Tell me another 3 celestial objects in our solar system that are NOT planets or the Sun.
Moons, Meteors, Comets, Asteroids, Dwarf Planets...
There is one star on the northern hemisphere of the celestial sphere that appears not to move in the sky. Name this star (real or coloquial name accepted).
North Star, Polaris
Other than the visible spectrum, name 4 types of frequencies that modern day astronomical instrumentation can detect.
Gamma rays, Microwaves, Infrared, Ultraviolet, Xray, Radiowaves...
The most common technique used to detect exoplanets and perform transmission spectroscopy. It involves observing a star as an exoplanet passes in front of it, causing a slight dip in the star's brightness.
Transit Method Spectroscopy
We used Salsa J in this unit to merge and split what type of images.
RGB Images
If we could condense the age of the universe into 1 year. On what date would humans appear?
December 31st
Early astronomers were able to observe a difference between stars and planets and therefore tell them appart due to retrigade motion. Explain this concept.
Retrograde motion is the apparent or actual motion of a celestial body in the opposite direction of most other bodies in the solar system. When referring to planets, retrograde motion is the brief reversal of a planet's motion as seen from Earth. is caused by the difference in orbital speeds of planets. It occurs when Earth passes a slower-moving planet or is passed by a faster-moving planet.
Explain how the photoelectric effect is used to take images of celestial objects.
When light from a distant object hits a detector, such as a silicon-based imaging sensor, it consists of photons striking individual pixels. Each photon that interacts with the silicon plate releases an electron. These liberated electrons are then collected in a positively charged reservoir. The number of electrons collected in each pixel corresponds directly to the intensity of light (or brightness) hitting that pixel.
The result is a greyscale image where the varying amounts of light captured by each pixel are represented as different shades of grey. Pixels that receive more photons will generate more electrons, appearing brighter, while those with fewer photons will appear darker. By capturing the varying intensities of light across the entire image, astronomers can create detailed visual representations of astronomical objects.
We observe a glowing cloud of gas in space with a spectroscope. We note that many of the familiar lines of hydrogen that we know on Earth seem to be in a different place. They are shifted toward the blue end of the spectrum compared to their positions in the spectrum of glowing hydrogen gas on Earth. From this we can conclude that...
The cloud is moving towards us.
On Stellarium we can observe different constellations at different times of the year. Why does our night sky change dramatically between winter and summer?
We are on opposite sides of the sun so, at night, we see opposite sides of space.