A solar system contains
a single star and planets.
How many centimeters are there in one kilometer?
100,000
The average distance from Earth to the sun is
1 AU
64,200,000,000 is equal to
6.42x10>10
4.4x10>6 divided by 8.8x10 10 is equal to
5.0x10>-5
If light takes 8 minutes to reach Earth from the sun and 5.3 hours to reach Pluto, what is the approximate distance from the sun to Pluto?
40 AU
The sun is
a star, more than 100 times the diameter of Earth and 1 AU from Earth.
If the nearest star is 4.2 light-years away, then
the light we see left the star 4.2 years ago.
Which arrangement is in order of increasing size, left to right?
planet, star, solar system, galaxy
The Milky Way Galaxy
contains about 100 billion stars.
In science fiction movies, it is common to use a space craft to travel across the Milky Way Galaxy or to assert that we have been visited by alien space craft from the other side of the Milky Way Galaxy. If one has a space craft that can travel at the spe
150,000 years
Suppose we wish to travel to the nearest star using a super space ship capable of traveling at 1x10>10 km/yr. We have nothing even close to this space ship yet. How long will it take us to get to the nearest star which is about 4x10>13 km away from us?
4000 years
Which sequence is correct when ordered by increasing size?
Earth, Solar System, Milky Way, galaxy clusters
If we say that an object is 1,000 light-years away we see it
as it looked 1,000 years ago
If the distance from the Sun to the Earth is represent by roughly 15 meters, then the distance from the Earth to the Moon on the same scale would be
smaller than your hand
In one way of naming stars, a ____ letter indicates its brightness relative to the other stars in the constellation.
Greek
Most of the constellations in use today originated in ____ mythology
Greek & Middle Eastern
is the brightest star in the constellation of Ursa Majoris
Ursa Majoris
The apparent visual magnitude of a star is 7.3. This tells us that the star is
not visible with the unaided eye
Which star in Table 2-1 would not be visible to the unaided eye of an observer on Earth?
Nim 8.07
The celestial equator is
a line around the sky directly above Earth's equator and the dividing line between the north and south celestial hemispheres
An observer in the Northern Hemisphere watches the sky for several hours. Due to the motion of Earth, this observer notices that the stars near the north celestial pole appear to move
counter clockwise.
You live at a latitude of 39 degrees S. What is the angle between the southern horizon and the south celestial pole?
39 degrees
You live at a latitude of 16 degrees S. What is the angle between the southern horizon and the south celestial pole?
16 degrees
What is the approximate latitude of the observer in the diagram below?
50 degrees N
An observer in the Northern Hemisphere takes a time exposure photograph of the night sky. If the illustration depicts the photograph taken by the observer, which direction was the camera pointing?
straight south (stars moving, center below horizon)
An observer in the Northern Hemisphere takes a time exposure photograph of the night sky. If the illustration depicts the photograph taken by the observer, which direction was the camera pointing
straight north (stars moving, center spot evident)
When it is winter in the northern hemisphere, it is ____ in the southern hemisphere.
summer
The sun moves ____ along the ecliptic among the stars.
eastward
The summer solstice (at the start of summer) is the point on the ecliptic where the sun
is farthest north of the celestial equator halting its northward movement
At the time of the winter solstice (the start of winter) the sun is
farthest south of the celestial equator
At the time of the winter solstice (the start of winter) the sunlight is at a lower angle and thus is ____ than(as) in the start of summer
less intense
The inclination of the axis of the earth varies from 22 to 24 degrees taking ____ to complete a cycle.
41,000 years
During the month of June the north celestial pole points towards Polaris but during the month of December it points
still towards Polaris
The first quarter moon rises
at about noon
A lunar eclipse occurs when
Earth passes between the Earth's moon and the sun
During a total lunar eclipse, which of the following are true?
The moon is in Earth's umbra and the moon is full
A totally eclipsed moon glows coppery red because
red light is better able to pass completely through Earth's atmosphere and reach the moon
During a total lunar eclipse
the moon will glow a coppery red
If the moon enters Earth's shadow but does not reach the umbra, the eclipse is termed
penumbral
A marble has a diameter of 2 cm. At what distance would the marble have an angular diameter of 1 arc second? Here one radian is 57.3 degrees, and one arc second is 1/3600 of a degree
4.1 km
If the Moon's orbital plane was aligned with the celestial equator we could
have eclipses only at the equinoxes
In which direction does the daily motion of the Moon occur in the sky, against the background stars, when viewed from the Earth?
Toward the east
Parallax is the apparent change in location of an object due to the motion of the observer.
True
Which of these were things ancient Greek astronomers never even considered in astronomy?
They considered each of the following: The Earth is round. Everything in the universe goes around the Earth. The Earth goes around the sun
The Almagest
is a collection of the science and mathematics of the Greeks
A(n) ____ is a circle whose center is located on the circumference of another circle
epicycle
Ptolemy's model of the universe
contained epicycles
____ introduced the concept of the eccentrics and epicycle to planetary motion about Earth, created a star catalog, and is generally credited with the development of trigonometry.
Hipparchus
The distance from Alexandria to Syene is about 500 miles. On the summer solstice the sun is directly overhead at noon in Syene. At Alexandria on the summer solstice, the sun is 1/50th of the circumference of the sky (about 7) south of the zenith. Based on
25,000 miles
Which of the following people did not accept a heliocentric model of the universe?
Tycho
The book "De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium
first described the Copernican theory
The Ptolemaic model of the universe was heliocentric
False
The Copernican system was no more accurate than the Ptolemaic system in predicting the positions of the planets because
the Copernican system included uniform circular motion
Brahe's universe was the same as the Copernican universe except that
Earth did not move
Tycho Brahe's greatest contribution to astronomy was
his years of careful observations of the planets
A ____ is a commonly accepted set of scientific ideas and assumptions
paradigm
Galileo's observations of the gibbous phase of Venus proved
that Venus orbits the sun
Galileo's telescopic discoveries of mountains on the moon and spots on the sun were controversial because they suggested that the sun and moon
are not perfect
The Copernican model of the solar system has the planets orbit the sun along elliptical paths.
False
Galileo's telescopic discovery of moons orbiting Jupiter was important because it showed that
the universe could contain centers of motion other than Earth and Earth might move along an orbit and not leave the moon behind
A ____ is a single conjecture that can be tested
hypothesis
A ____ is a system of rules and principles that can be applied to a wide variety of circumstances but may not be universally accepted
theory
Which of the following was not based on uniform circular motion?
the Rudolphine Tables
Halley's Comet has an orbital period of 76 years. What is the average distance of Halley's Comet from the sun?
18 AU
Saturn is on average 10 AU from the sun. What is the approximate orbital period of Saturn?
32 years
In pre-Copernican astronomy, it was almost universally believed that
the Earth was at the center of the universe
An apparent westward motion of a planet in the sky compared to the background stars (as viewed from the Earth) when observed on successive nights is referred to as
retrograde motion
Galileo wrote the Almagest
False
The purpose of using epicycles and deferents to explain the motion of the planets in the night sky was to account for
retrograde motion
Which of the following objects cannot transit (i.e. pass in front of) the Sun as seen from Jupiter?
Saturn
The greatest inaccuracy in Copernicus' model of the solar system was that the planets
traveled in circular orbits with uniform motion.
Which of the following planets can be seen as a crescent phase from Earth?
Mercury and Venus