Characteristics of Stars
Every galaxy in the universe includes more than a million of stars . A star is a large, shining ball of tremendously hot gas in space, which produces an immense amount of light and other forms of energy . In fact, the Sun is the closest star to the Earth, which is 150 million kilometers away . Stars burn with different colours and brightness; the hotter they are, the bluer they shine . The smaller the star, the longer it tends to live . Stars usually have a lifespan of 10,000 million years, and the smaller stars, named dwarf stars, live longer than larger stars, like the Sun . Stars larger than the Sun are the supergiant stars, such as Antares, which is approximately 10,000 times ...
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. The bluish ones would be the hottest, and the reddish and yellowish ones would be the coldest ones . The chart underneath shows the spectral type.
"Colour of Stars." Looking at the sky: Parallax . Web. 4 Feb 2010. .
The spectral type is actually each class of stars, which is identified by a letter , the seven capital letters are: O, B, A, F, G, K, M, going from the hottest to the coldest stars . They are allotted from the view of the star’s spectrum, thus compared with standard stellar spectra, which are arranged so that the pattern of features will be changed gradually with a surface temperature . For spectral analysis, to give you information about the temperature, chemical composition, rotational and radial velocities and magnetic fields, you would use a spectrograph . A spectrograph is an instrument used to split light from an object into its wavelengths that are occurring in ...
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to compare their brightness, impartially we have to be aware of how far they are . For the stars that are closer to the Earth, this problem can be solved and measured by basic trigonometry, but for the stars that are further away, comparisons can be figured with indistinguishable stars close to deduce approximate values . The brightness of stars is measured on a scale called magnitude: the brightest stars are at 0 or possibly below zero, in the minus magnitude . The image below is an example of a star magnitude scale.
Star Magnitude Scale." The Birth, Life and Death of Stars. Web. 18 Feb 2010. .
The inherent brightness of ...
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Characteristics of Stars. (2011, April 3). Retrieved December 23, 2024, from http://www.essayworld.com/essays/Characteristics-of-Stars/97458
"Characteristics of Stars." Essayworld.com. Essayworld.com, 3 Apr. 2011. Web. 23 Dec. 2024. <http://www.essayworld.com/essays/Characteristics-of-Stars/97458>
"Characteristics of Stars." Essayworld.com. April 3, 2011. Accessed December 23, 2024. http://www.essayworld.com/essays/Characteristics-of-Stars/97458.
"Characteristics of Stars." Essayworld.com. April 3, 2011. Accessed December 23, 2024. http://www.essayworld.com/essays/Characteristics-of-Stars/97458.
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