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Published byClarissa Quinn Modified over 9 years ago
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A Star is Born Photo in 1995 of the Orion Nebula.
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Stars…. …are massive, hot, glowing balls of gas …produce their energy via nuclear fusion in their cores …lifestyles are determined by the struggle for equilibrium between gravity and pressure mass energy
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http://haydenplanetarium.org/movies/ava/S0801starform.mpg Star Nurseries … nebula – interstellar cloud of gas and dust a star is born in the Orion Nebula Hayden Planetarium, American Museum of Natural History
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A star is born… From collapsing cold clouds of interstellar gas and dust… clouds rotate as they collapse … conserving angular momentum … forming the smaller clumps that will become stars Orion Nebula
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Birth of a Star: Nebula Black Widow Nebula
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Birth of a Star: Nebula Crab Nebula
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Birth of a Star: Nebula Bow Shock: Named for the crescent- shaped wave made by a ship as it moves through the water, a bow shock can be created in space where two streams of gas collide.
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Birth of a Star: Nebula Bok globules or Thackeray's Globules are dark clouds of dense cosmic dust and gas in which star formation sometimes takes place.
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A star’s initial mass determines its life High Mass Stars – Bright – Burn “fuel” rapidly (hundreds of millions of years) – Have very short lives – Example: Rigel in the Orion Constellation Low Mass Stars –Less bright –“Burn” for billions of years –Have very long lives –Examples: Sun, brown dwarfs
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A star’s fate depends on its mass. Life Cycles of Stars Stars and Galaxies A star with a mass similar to the sun’s will become a white dwarf.
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A star with a mass eight or more times greater than the sun’s will either become a black hole or a neutron star. Life Cycles of Stars Stars and Galaxies
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The Hertzsprung-Russell diagram plots a star’s luminosity against its surface temperature. The diagram’s groups of stars represent life- cycle stages of stars. Most stars are main- sequence stars. VOCABULARY Life Cycles of Stars Stars and Galaxies Hertzsprung- Russell diagram Temperature Luminosity HottestCoolest Highes t Lowest Blue Supergiants Red Supergiants Red Giants Red Dwarfs White Dwarfs main sequence giant star supergiants white dwarf nebula planetary nebula supernova neutron star pulsar black hole
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Hertzsprung-Russell Diagram: – Ejmar Hertzsprung (1873-1967) – Copenhagen – Began his career as a Chemical Engineer. While working and independently at the same time… – Henry Norris Russell (1877-1957) – Princeton – Student then professor. – A graph that separates the effects of temperature and surface area on stellar luminosities. – The HR Diagram is much like the same thing as producing a graph of people’s height vs. weight.
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Hertzsprung-Russell diagram Parts of an H-R diagram Main-sequence stars 90% of all stars Band through the center of the H-R diagram Sun is in the main-sequence Giants (or red giants) Very luminous Large Upper-right on the H-R diagram
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Hertzsprung-Russell diagram Parts of an H-R diagram Giants (or red giants) Very large giants are called supergiants Only a few percent of all stars White dwarfs Fainter than main-sequence stars Small (approximate the size of Earth) Lower-central area on the H-R diagram Not all are white in color Perhaps 10% of all stars
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Hertzsprung-Russell diagram
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