Stars and Their Characteristics

Hydrogen and helium are the two most

abundant elements in stars.
HERCULES LYRA

CYGNUS

DRACO
BOÖTES

CANES
VENATICI URSA CEPHUS LACERTA
MINOR
COMA
BERENICES
CASSIOPEIA
PEGASUS
URSA CAMELOPARDALIS
MAJOR
LEO
PERSEUS
LEO MINOR LYNX PISCES
Stars and Their Characteristics
Stars and Their Characteristics

Stars differ in mass, size, and surface temperature.

Surface temperature affects the color of stars.
Apparent magnitude, luminosity, and absolute
magnitude are used to describe the brightness of
stars.
Betelgeuse

There are stars of different

brightness in the constellation
Orion, including two of the
brightest stars as viewed from
Earth—Betelgeuse and Rigel.

Rigel
 Stars and Their Characteristics

Stars that show variation in brightness are known

as variable stars.

Distances in space are measured in astronomical

units, light-years, and parsecs.
Light-Year The distance that light travels in
one year, about 9.5 trillion kilometers.

Parsec A unit of measurement used to

describe distances between celestial objects,
equal to 3.258 light-years.
Spectral Types
 Apparent Magnitude
Some stars appear
very bright but are
actually fainter stars
that lie closer to us.
Similarly, we can see
stars that appear to
be faint, but are
intrinsically very
bright ones lying far
away from Earth.
Apparent Magnitude

Apparent Magnitude
The measure of
how bright a star
appears to be to
an observer on
Earth.
Stars and Their Characteristics

Luminosity: The brightness of a star or

the power radiated by the star.
The luminosity is a quantity
that depends on the star
itself, not on how far away it
is. For this reason a star's
luminosity tells you about
the internal physics of the
star and is a more
important quantity than the
apparent brightness.
What does the luminosity of a star
depend on?
 Temperature (proportional to T4)

 Size (proportional to R2)

 Full blown formula? L=4pR2sT4

A star can be luminous because it is hot or it is large
(or both!).

The luminosity of
an object = the
amount of energy
every square meter
produces multiplied
by its surface area.
Caution!

 Do not confuse the size of an object

with the mass of an object.
 Just because an object is large in
dimension does not necessarily
mean it is also large in mass.
 For example, you can have a forty
foot tall by three foot across
marshmallow that looks “large,” but
that does not mass as much as that
of a “small” football sized hunk of
lead.
Absolute Magnitude
Absolute
Magnitude: The
measure of how
bright a star
would be if it
were located 10
parsecs from
Earth.
On the left-hand map of Canis Major, dot sizes indicate stars'
apparent magnitudes; the dots match the brightnesses of the
stars as we see them.

The right-hand version indicates the same stars' absolute

magnitudes — how bright they would appear if they were all
placed at the same distance (32.6 light-years) from Earth.
Absolute magnitude is a measure of true stellar luminosity.
Measuring the Distance to Stars

 Measuring

distances is
difficult.

The best method for measuring distances of

nearby stars is called parallax.

It relies on observing a star from two different

places.
Measuring the Distance to Stars

Parallax, or more accurately motion

parallax (Greek: παραλλαγή (parallagé)
= alteration) is the change of angular
position of two stationary points relative
to each other as seen by an observer,
caused by the motion of an observer.
Simply put, it is the apparent shift of an
object against a background caused by
a change in observer position.
 Measuring Distances: Parallax

 The larger the star’s distance, d, the smaller its

parallax p.

 So distance and parallax are inversely related.

d= 1/p
 Measuring Distances: Parallax
 Most stars have a parallax angle, p, which is very small.

 The angle of parallax, p, is usually measured in arc seconds

 60 arc seconds = 1 arc minute

 60 arc minutes = 1 degree.

 Distances to stars are measured in either: light years, or

parsecs.

 1 parsec = 3.2 light years

(parsec = PARallax of one arcSEC)
 If a star’s parallax is 1 arc second, then its distance is 1 parsec.
Constellations: A group of stars that appear to form a pattern in
the sky.
 Constellations
 Constellations are easily recognizable
patterns that help people orient themselves
using the night sky. There are 88 “official”
constellations.
 Hundreds of the brightest stars, those visible
with the unaided eye, were given names in
ancient times.
 Today stars are named by their coordinates
on the celestial sphere. This is an imaginary
sphere surrounding Earth.
Constellations
All stars and objects in
space, can be mapped
relative to the poles
and equator of the
celestial sphere. Their
position north or south
of the celestial equator
— essentially their
latitude — is called
“declination.” Their
position east or west
essentially is their
longitude, or right
ascension, measured
in hours, minutes, and
seconds.
Constellations
The stars are distant objects.
Their distances vary, but they are
all very far away. Excluding our
Sun, the nearest star, Proxima
Centauri, is more than 4 light
years away. As Earth spins, the
stars appear to move across our
night sky from east to west, for the
same reason that our Sun
appears to “rise” in the east and
“set” in the west.
 Constellations
 If
observed through the year, the
constellations shift gradually to
the west. This is caused by
Earth’s orbit around our Sun. In
the summer, viewers are looking
in a different direction in space at
night than they are during the
winter.
 Stars close to the celestial poles,
the imaginary points where
Earth’s north and south axes
point in space, have a very small
circle of spin. Polaris, Earth’s
north “pole star,” will appear to
move very little in the night sky.
The farther from Polaris, the wider
the circle the stars trace.
 Stars that make a full circle around a
celestial pole, like those in the Big and
Little Dippers in the northern hemisphere,
are called “circumpolar stars.” They stay in
the night sky and do not set. At the
equator, there are no circumpolar stars
because the celestial poles are located at
the horizon. All stars observed at the
equator rise in the east and set in the
west.
 Constellations
HERCULES LYRA

CYGNUS

DRACO
BOÖTES

CANES VENATICI
URSA MINOR CEPHUS LACERTA

COMA BERENICES

CASSIOPEIA
PEGASUS

URSA MAJOR
CAMELOPARDALIS

LEO
PERSEUS
LEO MINOR LYNX PISCES
Life Cycles of Stars
The Hertzsprung-Russell diagram plots a star’s luminosity
against its surface temperature.
Red Supergiants
The diagram’s groups Blue Supergiants

Highest
of stars represent life-
cycle stages of stars.
Most stars are main-
sequence stars. Luminosity Red Giants

Hertzsprung-
Russell diagram White
Dwarfs Red Dwarfs
Lowest

Hottest Temperature Coolest

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.
Life Cycles of Stars

A star’s fate depends on its mass.

A star with a mass similar to the sun’s will become

a white dwarf.
Stars and Galaxies

Life Cycles of Stars

A star with a mass eight or more times greater

than the sun’s will either become a black hole
or a neutron star.
Properties of stars
Color and temperature
•Hot star
 Temperature above 30,000 K
 Emits short-wavelength light
 Appears blue
•Cool star
 Temperature less than 3000 K
 Emits longer-wavelength light
 Appears red
Properties of stars
 Color and temperature
•Between 5000 and 6000 K
 Stars appear yellow
 e.g., Sun
 Binary stars and stellar mass
•Binary stars
 Two stars orbiting one another
 Stars are held together by mutual
gravitation
 Both orbit around a common center of
mass
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
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
Hertzsprung-Russell diagram
Birth of a Star: Nebula
 Stars are born in a glowing cloud of
interstellar gas and dust (mostly
hydrogen), called a nebula.
 Gravity causes every atom and every bit
of dust to pull on every other one and all
move to the center, causing the protostar
to collapse.
 Because the atoms move faster and faster
as they fall toward the center, friction is
created as they rub together and the
temperature rises.
 Heat causes the protostar to glow in with its own light,
giving off even more light than our Sun even though it is
not nearly as hot.
 When a temperature of about 27,000,000°F is reached,
nuclear fusion begins. This is the nuclear reaction in
which hydrogen atoms are converted to helium atoms
plus energy. This energy (radiation) production prevents
further contraction of the star.
 The protostar is now a stable main sequence star
which will remain in this state for about 10 billion years.
After that, the hydrogen fuel is depleted and the star
begins to die.
Main Sequence Stars
Main Sequence: A star that is at the point in its life cycle
in which it is actively fusing hydrogen nuclei into helium
nuclei;

Our sun is a
main sequence
star.
 Giant Stars
A Giant Star: is large star with great luminosity and a
diameter 10 to 100 times greater than that of the sun.

A giant star is one of two

kinds very large stars
the other being a Red
giant or Supergiant

Red giants are stars of 1000 times the

volume of the Sun which have exhausted
the supply of hydrogen in their cores and
switched to fusing hydrogen in a shell
outside the core.
Supergiants
Supergiants: are the most luminous, most massive stars,
with diameters greater than 100 times the diameter of
the sun.
The best known example
is Rigel, the brightest star
in the constellation of
Orion. It has a mass of
around 20 times that of
the Sun and gives out
more light than 60,000
suns added together.
White Dwarf : The remnant of a giant star that
has lost its outer atmosphere; the glowing stellar core.
 A white dwarf is what stars like our Sun become after
they have exhausted their nuclear fuel. Near the end of
its nuclear burning stage, such a star expels most of its
outer material, creating a planetary nebula.

White Dwarf:

Sirius–B, this white

dwarf is very hot due
to high density and
rapid spin.
Neutron star: The superdense remains of a massive star that collapsed
with enough force to push all of its electrons into the nuclei they orbit, resulting in a
mass of neutrons.

 A neutron star is formed from the collapsed remnant a Type II, Type
Ib, or Type Ic supernova.

• Pulsar – general
term for neutron
stars that emit
directed pulses of
radiation towards
us at regular
intervals due to
their strong
magnetic fields.
Supernova: The brilliant burst of light that follows the collapse
of the iron core of a massive star.

 Supernovae are the main source of all the elements

heavier than oxygen, and they are the only source of
many important elements.

X-ray image of the

remnant of Kepler's
Supernova
 Black hole: The final life stage of an extremely massive star,
with a gravitational field so intense that not even light can escape.

Black holes are areas in

space where there is a huge
amount of mass in a very small
space. The gravity of this
mass is so great that
everything in the area is pulled
toward the mass. Even light,
with its tiny mass, is pulled into
the center of the hole. No
object can escape the
gravitational pull of a black
hole.
Black hole: The final life stage of an extremely massive star,
with a gravitational field so intense that not even light can escape.

 We can't see a black hole because no light

escapes the event. Astronomers use other ways
to look for black holes. Since they have large
masses and gravities, they affect the
surrounding stars and systems. They have
found evidence of black holes in the dark
centers of galaxies and systems that emit large
amounts of x-rays.
How does a black hole form?
 A black hole forms when any object reaches
a certain critical density, and its gravity
causes it to collapse to an almost infinitely
small pinpoint. Stellar-mass black holes
form when a massive star can no longer
produce energy in its core. With the
radiation from its nuclear reactions to keep
the star "puffed up," gravity causes the core
to collapse. The star's outer layers may
blast away into space, or they may fall into
the black hole to make it heavier.
Black hole: The final life stage of an extremely massive star,
with a gravitational field so intense that not even light can escape.

 Supermassive black holes containing

millions to billions of times the mass of the
sun are believed to exist in the center of
most galaxies, including our own Milky Way.
 Intermediate-mass black holes, whose size

is measured in thousands of solar masses,

may exist. Intermediate-mass black holes
have been proposed as a possible power
source for ultra-luminous X ray sources.