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AST101 Lecture 20 The Parts of the Galaxy
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Shape of the Galaxy
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Constituents of the Galaxy ~4 x 10 11 stars (90% of the visible mass) Disk population (population I) –Younger stars –Higher metallicity –Orbits in plane of Galaxy Spheroidal population (population II) –Older stars –Lower metallicity –Randomly-directed orbits –Globular Clusters
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Globular Cluster About 10 10 years old 10 5 - 10 6 stars Radius ~ 10 light years Most massive star: ~ 1 solar mass ~150 globular clusters known in Milky Way
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Age and Location The oldest population is the halo (including the globular clusters) The bulge is also old The disk is youngest The age is correlated with flatness The Sun is in the disk
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Constituents of the Galaxy Gas and dust (10% of the visible mass) Interstellar medium: –Warm 10 4 K to hot 10 6 K –Low density: 0.01 - 1 H/cm 3 Molecular clouds: –Cold: <100K –Dense: 10 3 -10 4 H/cm 3 ~1% dust-to-gas ratio. Dust: mostly carbon and silicates
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Barnard 163 dark cloud
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Evidence for the ISM We see absorption by dark clouds We see absorption lines in the spectra of stars We see emission from Hydrogen Distant stars are fainter and redder than expected The ISM attenuates starlight by about 1 magnitude every 3000 light years
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Reddening Illustrated
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Red, Reddening, Redshifted Red: a color. Red stars are cooler than blue stars (remember the blackbody) Reddening: the effect of interstellar absorption. Dust absorbs/scatters blue light more than red light. The reason the sky is blue. Redshift: Doppler shift from a source moving away
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The Neighborhood
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Charting the Galaxy
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Gas and Dust in the IR
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Hydrogen in the Galactic Plane
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The 21 cm line of Hydrogen Hydrogen is abundant (90% of all atoms) Radio waves penetrate gas and dust Velocities let us map out location of H in the Galaxy
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Spiral Arms An effervescent phenomenon
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Spiral Density Waves
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Spiral Arms Marked by: Pileup of gas and dust Star formation due to increased densities Bright young stars Inter-arm regions: uniform density of stars
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Meet the Neighbors
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Large Magellanic Cloud
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How the Milky Way Was Built The Sagittarius Dwarf Galaxy
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Orbit of the Sgr Dwarf Galaxy
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Galactic Cannibalism
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