midterm2-studyguide (1)

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School

The University of Oklahoma *

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Course

1504

Subject

Astronomy

Date

Oct 30, 2023

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pdf

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Uploaded by CaptainChinchilla3775

ASTR 1504/1514 Midterm 2 Study Guide – Fall 2023 Light/Spectroscopy ● How does the energy of a photon depend on its wavelength/frequency? How does the color of a photon depend on wavelength/frequency? ● How does the apparent brightness of an object depend on its distance from you? What about its luminosity? ● What does the spectrum of a blackbody curve tell you? What happens when the temperature of a blackbody changes? ● When do you expect to observe a continuous spectrum? What about an absorption/emission spectrum? What is happening on an atomic level to make those absorption/emission features appear? Why is spectroscopy such a useful technique? ● What’s the Doppler effect? How does that relate to observed absorption lines shifting? How does the radial velocity of an object affect the amount of shift? The space between the stars - The Interstellar Medium (ISM) ● What is the environment like in the ISM? What do we know about the density of the material there? Composition? ● We observe different types of clouds in the ISM, what do we know about their different properties? What do you expect to see when you observe them? What are the atoms in those clouds doing? ● Does dust in the ISM affect our observations of stars and galaxies in space? How so? Star Formation ● What physical forces are present in a molecular cloud? How does the collapse end up happening? What is the eventual result of a collapsing molecular cloud? Could you explain that overall evolution story to a friend who wants to know how you make a star? ● What are some defining features of a protostellar system? In other words, what have we discovered about how baby stars evolve? What is accretion?

Protoplanetary Disks ● How do astronomers figure out that there’s a disk around a star? Hint: What’s a “SED” and how do you measure one? ● What are coronagraphic observations? Why do astronomers make that type of observation? ● How long do we think it takes to make planets? How do we know that? ● What have we learned so far about disks? Do we always see them at a certain orientation? If not, why is that useful? What types of light do we like to observe from these systems and why? Planet Formation ● What are our leading theories for planet formation? Could you explain them to a friend in your own words? What do these theories get wrong? What’s the idea behind planetary migration? Exoplanet Detection ● What are the five different ways astronomers have found exoplanets? Could you explain to a friend how the particularly successful methods work in your own words? What are their respective pros and cons? Exoplanet Trends/Statistics ● We’ve now found thousands of exoplanets over the past ~30 years. What have we realized so far about exoplanets in general? Do you understand the important inferences we made from the different exoplanet graphs we looked at in class? Planets and their Stars - Habitability Zones ● What’s a habitability zone? What can influence the habitability of a planet? What are astronomers looking for now with exoplanets and how will we do it? The Sun ● What are the interior (and exterior) layers of the Sun and their properties? What do we know about strange solar properties like sunspots, coronal loops, and coronal mass ejections? Do we have outstanding questions about any solar phenomena?

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