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Publisher
The Great Courses
Pub. Date
2024.
Description
Observations of the transit of Venus across the face of the Sun in the 18th century helped determine the scale of the Solar System. In the wider Universe, distances are so vast that the finite speed of light means we are literally looking back in time.
9) Understanding the Universe: An Introduction to Astronomy, 2nd Edition: Episode 43Stars-Distant Suns
Publisher
The Great Courses
Pub. Date
2024.
Description
A voyage to another star would require exact information on distances and properties of the stars. This lecture shows how astronomers measure the distance to nearby stars and how they determine their surface temperatures, which are the basis for stellar classification.
Publisher
The Great Courses
Pub. Date
2024.
Description
As it gradually uses up the hydrogen in its core, fusing it to helium, the Sun will expand to form a red giant star. Through a series of relatively nonviolent eruptions, it will expel its outer layers of gas, producing a beautiful, glowing nebula around the dying core.
Publisher
The Great Courses
Pub. Date
2024.
Description
Star clusters are gravitationally bound groups of stars that are all about the same age and the same distance from Earth. Astronomers can determine the approximate ages of clusters. This lecture also explains how the distance of extremely remote stars is found.
Publisher
The Great Courses
Pub. Date
2024.
Description
Beginning a sequence of lectures on the Solar System, you start with the Sun, which you explore from the interior to the surface. Sunspots are cooler regions associated with strong magnetic fields, and violent eruptions blast solar material into space.
Publisher
The Great Courses
Pub. Date
2024.
Description
The burned out Sun will eventually contract into a white dwarf. This is the fate of all stars between roughly 0.08 and 8 solar masses. A white dwarf in a binary system may steal matter from its companion star and flare up in an eruption called a nova.
Publisher
The Great Courses
Pub. Date
2024.
Description
This lecture discusses the Hertzsprung-Russell diagram, a plot of stellar surface temperature versus luminosity that contains a wealth of information. Stars spend most of their existence on the diagram's well-defined main sequence; outliers include supergiants and white dwarfs.
Publisher
The Great Courses
Pub. Date
2024.
Description
Brown dwarfs are low-mass objects whose dim glow is caused by slow gravitational contraction and the fusion of deuterium, a heavier but far less abundant isotope of hydrogen. Free-floating planets have even less mass than brown dwarfs and are not associated with any star.
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