Origins
This term is used to describe the moment of creation of the Universe
What is the Big Bang?
This is the name of the process by which heavier elements are formed from lighter ones.
What is nuclear fusion?
This section of a star is where light elements combine into heavier elements, releasing tremendous amounts of energy.
What is the core?
This dimly glowing cloud of gas is created by the death of a low mass star.
What is a planetary nebula?
Our Sun, like the popular pen, has this classification.
What is G-2?
This signal is found in every direction in the sky and is evidence that our universe was once hot and dense enough to be opaque to light.
What is the Cosmic Microwave Background radiation?
At the center of a star, two hydrogen atoms can combine to form this element.
What is Helium?
In this section of the sun, buoyant forces cause hot plasma to rise toward the surface, carrying with it energy from deep within the star
What is the convective zone?
This remnant of a low mass star may continue shining for millions of years as it cools. Current theory believes that a layer of this object may be composed of pure diamond.
What is a white dwarf?
These stars account for the majority of stars on the Herzsprung-Russell (luminosity vs temperature) diagram.
What are main sequence stars?
These two types of matter, which can annihilate on contact with each other, first formed as the universe cooled down
What are matter and antimatter
These are the two conditions that have to be met for lighter elements to combine into heavier elements.
What are extremely high temperatures and pressures?
This part of the sun can be observed by someone standing in the full shadow of the moon during a total solar eclipse
What is the corona?
This rapidly spinning incredibly dense object emits electromagnetic radiation from regions on its surface. Due to its rotation we see these emissions as pulses
What is a pulsar?
These are the letters used to classify stars according to their temperature, from hottest to coldest.
What are O, B, A, F, G, K, M?
These massive structures would form as the result of small density fluctuations in the extremely hot plasma of the early universe.
Level 1: What are galaxies?
Level 2: What are galaxy clusters?
level 3: What are galaxy superclusters?
This element, produced in the heart of a massive star, will cause the star to die.
What is Iron?
This zone is not hot enough for elements to combine and is opaque to electromagnetic radiation. Energy is transferred slowly through constant absorption and reemission of high energy photons.
What is the Radiative Zone?
This object can be formed in the death throes of a truly massive star. Its gravity is so intense that light cannot escape.
What is a black hole?
These are ripples in spacetime, caused by massive objects rapidly orbiting one another.
What are gravity waves?
As the universe cooled to the point where stable matter could exist, these three elements would serve as the building blocks for all other matter
What are Hydrogen, Helium, and Lithium?
The heaviest elements formed in nature are a result of this process.
What is fusion in a supernova
This layer of the Sun has a temperature of around 5,500oC and shows surface features such as sunspots and granulation.
What is the Photosphere?
This rapidly spinning, hyper-dense object has the strongest magnetic field of anything in the universe
What is a magnetar?
Matter that seems to exist due to gravitational evidence but we cannot detect or account for through observation of electromagnetic radiation.
What is Dark Matter?