Astronomy and Astrophysics
Textbook Exam Questions
Course Introduction
This course introduces students to the fundamental concepts of astronomy and astrophysics, exploring the origin, structure, and evolution of the universe. Topics include the properties of stars, galaxies, and planetary systems, as well as the physical laws governing celestial phenomena. Students will examine observational techniques, such as optical and radio astronomy, and analyze data to understand stellar life cycles, black holes, and cosmology. Through lectures and practical assignments, the course fosters critical thinking and scientific inquiry into the universe's most compelling mysteries.
Recommended Textbook Astronomy Today 8th Edition by Eric Chaisson
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28 Chapters
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Chapter 1: Charting the Heavens: The Foundations of Astronomy
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Sample Questions
Q1) On April 8,2005,observers off New Zealand observe an annular eclipse at sunrise,and those in Columbia see an annular eclipse at sunset.Yet in the middle of the path,off the Galapagos Islands,cruise ships are advertising that they will show their guests a total solar eclipse.How can this be possible?
Answer: The Earth's radius is about 6,000 km (4,000 miles),so this means that at noon,when the Sun is highest overhead,the cruise ship passengers will be just close enough to the Moon to see it big enough to cover the Sun,if only for a few seconds.
Q2) The parallax shift of a star would be greater if viewed from Mars than from Earth. A)True
B)False
Answer: True
Q3) If you are in the Moon's umbral shadow,then you will witness: A) nighttime.
B) a total solar eclipse.
C) a total lunar eclipse.
D) a partial solar eclipse.
E) some kind of lunar eclipse.
Answer: B
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Chapter 2: The Copernican Revolution: The Birth of Modern Science
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Sample Questions
Q1) Tycho Brahe's contribution to Kepler's Laws of Planetary Motion was:
A) his detailed and accurate observations of the planet's position.
B) his observations of Jupiter's moons.
C) a mathematical explanation of epicycles.
D) a precise lunar calendar.
E) the correct explanation of lunar phases.
Answer: A
Q2) Explain how Newton could turn observations of a cannonball in flight into a satellite orbit.
Answer: Newton noted that the faster the ball was fired,the farther downrange it fell.He realized that if the speed were the orbital velocity of 18,000 mph,the ball would fall with a curvature that matched the Earth's,and remain in orbit.
Q3) Kepler based his theories on the precise planetary observations of Tycho Brahe.
A)True
B)False
Answer: True
Q4) What is meant by the Astronomical Unit?
Answer: The Astronomical unit,or AU,is the mean distance between the Earth and Sun.
Page 4
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Chapter 3: Radiation: Information from the Cosmos
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Sample Questions
Q1) Which statement gives the relationship between the waves in the electric and magnetic fields in an electromagnetic wave?
A) They are in phase and parallel with each other in space.
B) They are 90 degrees out of phase but parallel in space.
C) They are in phase but perpendicular to each other in space.
D) They are 180 degrees out of phase and random in their inclinations to each other.
E) They are in phase but opposite in direction of motion.
Answer: C
Q2) The total energy radiated by a blackbody depends on:
A) the fourth power of its temperature.
B) the square of its temperature.
C) the square root of its temperature.
D) the cube root of its temperature.
E) the cube of its temperature.
Answer: A
Q3) Give an example of the Doppler Effect being used in a baseball game.
Answer: The Doppler "gun" can focus on the motion of the baseball,and give us the speed that the pitcher is delivering it to the plate.
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Chapter 4: Spectroscopy: The Inner Workings of Atoms
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Q1) If the magnetic fields are very strong,such as around sunspots,how are spectral lines affected by the Zeeman effect?
Q2) ________ is the process of stripping electrons from their atoms.
Q3) The longer the wavelength of the photon,the ________ the energy it carries.
Q4) An emission spectrum can be used to identify a(n):
A) proton.
B) electron.
C) neutron.
D) atom.
E) neutrino.
Q5) A cool,thin gas produces absorption lines.
A)True
B)False
Q6) Define emission lines.
Q7) Molecular spectra,like elemental ones,involve only the vibration of the particles.
A)True
B)False
Q8) Why are molecular lines usually found in infrared and radio regions,not as visible lines?
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Chapter 5: Telescopes: The Tools of Astronomy
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Q1) What is the resolving power of the telescope?
A) the ability to make distant objects appear closer
B) the ability to collect a lot of light
C) the ability to detect very faint objects
D) the ability to distinguish adjacent objects in the sky
E) the ability to separate light into its component colors
Q2) It is much easier to build large reflectors than large refractors.
A)True
B)False
Q3) The simplest scope design,by Isaac Newton,uses only a primary mirror.
A)True
B)False
Q4) Which of these devices helps correct coma in fast reflectors?
A) Cassegrain secondary mirror
B) star diagonal
C) achromatic doublet
D) Schmidt corrector plate
E) Newtonian secondary mirror
Q5) Describe at least three advantages of CCD imaging over visual or photographic work.
7
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Chapter 6: The Solar System: Comparative Planetology and Formation Models
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Q1) Dust is an important part of the nebular theory of solar system formation because dust is needed to explain:
A) how the inner planets came to be rocky bodies.
B) how the outer planets came to be gaseous bodies.
C) how the initial cloud cooled enough to collapse.
D) how the initial cloud heated as it contracted.
E) why the icy bodies are located so far from the Sun.
Q2) Name three properties of the solar nebula still seen in planet orbits.
Q3) The solar system contains the Sun,eight major bodies called planets,and at least thousands of smaller bodies.
A)True
B)False
Q4) The asteroids are very young and appear to be made from the same material. A)True B)False
Q5) Our solar system contains more than 100 Kuiper Belt objects larger than 300 km in diameter.
A)True
B)False
Page 8
Q6) Discuss the role that gravity assist played in Voyager 2 and its Grand Tour.
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Chapter 7: Earth: Our Home in Space
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Sample Questions
Q1) The speed of the current warming trend is no different than those seen in fossil records.
A)True
B)False
Q2) What gas is the primary constituent of our atmosphere?
A) oxygen
B) carbon dioxide
C) nitrogen
D) hydrogen
E) helium
Q3) Why is the sky blue?
A) The atmosphere reflects the color of the oceans.
B) The atmosphere reflects the light from the Sun.
C) The atmosphere scatters the light from the Sun.
D) The oceans refract the light from the Sun into the atmosphere.
E) The oceans reflect the light from the Sun into the atmosphere.
Q4) Describe the two different kinds of seismic waves.Distinguish between them by describing how they move through Earth's interior.
Q5) Why does the Earth's atmosphere contain much more nitrogen than hydrogen?
Page 10
Q6) Describe several features on the Earth's crust explained by plate tectonics.
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Chapter 8: The Moon and Mercury: Scorched and Battered Worlds
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Q1) Lunar volcanism is obvious from the huge mare basins,and the more localized
Q2) From Earth,due to their motions and the fact that the Sun lights only a portion of each surface,both Mercury and the Moon:
A) always look full from Earth.
B) appear to go through phases.
C) pass through Earth's shadow.
D) appear to be half-lit by the Sun.
E) always have the same side facing Earth.
Q3) Two Mercury years are the same length as three Mercury sidereal days.
A)True
B)False
Q4) How is it possible for Mercury and the Moon to have water ice at their poles?
Q5) Which of these would support the capture theory of the Moon's origin?
A) the Caloris Basin on Mercury
B) the retrograde orbit and large orbital inclination of Neptune's moon Triton
C) the rings of all the jovians lying around their equators
D) the Pluto-Charon system
E) the four large moons of Jupiter orbit its equator
Q6) Because of their low surface gravities,the Moon and Mercury lack ________. Page 11
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Chapter 9: Venus: Earth's Sister Planet
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Q1) Other than its atmosphere,name two properties of Venus that are unique among the terrestrial planets.
Q2) The synodic period of Venus is about how many Earth years?
A) about 5 years
B) about 3.5 years
C) about 2 years
D) about 1.25 years
E) about 0.7 years
Q3) Why does Venus appear so bright to the eye?
A) It gets closer to us than any other planet does.
B) Venus is closer to the Sun, so gets more intense sunlight.
C) The planet's cloud-cover is highly reflective, reflecting 60% of the Sun's light.
D) As seen from Earth, the disk of Venus can appear larger than any other planet's.
E) All of the above are correct.
Q4) Discuss the evidence that suggests that Venus is still very active volcanically.
Q5) Discuss the fate of meteoroids upon entering the atmosphere of Venus.How do the impact craters found on the surface support this idea? How are the numbers of impact craters affected by volcanism?
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Chapter 10: Mars: A Near Miss for Life?
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Q1) The residual polar cap that does not vanish during the Martian summer is
Q2) Seasonal changes in the darker surface features of Mars are due to ________.
Q3) Phobos and Deimos are probably captured comet nuclei.
A)True
B)False
Q4) What is thought to be the reason that there are no small impact craters on Mars?
A) Like Venus, Mars' atmosphere is too thick and these meteorites do not survive to make impacts on the surface.
B) The surface of Mars is too young to have impact craters.
C) Due to the gravitational pull of Mars' moons, most small meteoroids are deflected and never make it to the surface.
D) The wind blows small dust particles, eroding the surface of Mars, erasing small impact craters faster than they can form.
E) None of the above. Mars has lots of small impact craters.
Q5) The magnetic field of Mars was first detected by the Mars Global Surveyor.
A)True B)False
Q6) Mars appears red due to ________ on its surface.
Page 14
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Chapter 11: Jupiter: Giant of the Solar System
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Q1) Jupiter puts back into space twice the energy it gets from the Sun.
A)True
B)False
Q2) Which of the Galilean moons is the densest and most geologically active?
A) Io
B) Europa
C) Ganymede
D) Callisto
E) Titan
Q3) What is the origin of the jovian moons?
A) They all formed with the planet.
B) They were main belt asteroids, captured by Jupiter's strong gravity.
C) They are Trojan asteroids, orbiting 60 degrees ahead or behind Jupiter.
D) The four Galilean moons formed with Jupiter, most others were later captures.
E) They were ripped from the planet's interior in an early cataclysmic event.
Q4) What is oblateness,and what does it tell us about Jupiter's interior?
Q5) Jupiter radiates twice as much energy as it receives from solar light; the source of this "excess" energy is ________.
Q6) Except for Io,the other three Galilean satellites have periods of rotation and revolution that are ________.
Page 15
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Chapter 12: Saturn: Spectacular Rings and Mysterious
Moons
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Q1) Shepherd satellites are defined as:
A) satellites in the coma of a comet.
B) moons that confine a narrow ring.
C) a type of moon that orbits another moon.
D) moons that follow the exact orbit of another, larger, moon.
E) moons that orbit inside the system of rings.
Q2) The Roche limit is the point at which:
A) the mass of an object classifies it as a moon.
B) a moon orbiting a planet experiences synchronous rotation.
C) the external tidal forces on an object are strong enough to be felt by the object.
D) the external tidal forces on an object become greater than the internal forces that hold it together.
E) the internal forces that hold an object together weaken so that the object falls apart.
Q3) Saturn's cloud layer is over twice as thick as Jupiter's cloud layer.
A)True
B)False
Q4) What element is notably deficient in Saturn's atmosphere,and why?
Q5) Compare the weather visible on the disks of Jupiter and Saturn.
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Chapter 13: Uranus and Neptune: The Outer Worlds of the Solar System
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Q1) Neptune's large moon ________ is the only large satellite known in a retrograde orbit.
Q2) Which moon of Uranus has the strangest terrain? What is a possible explanation for its jumbled appearance?
Q3) In terms of axial tilt,which of the jovians shows us the largest inclination?
A) Jupiter
B) Saturn
C) Uranus
D) Neptune
E) Pluto
Q4) On Bode's advice,Herschel named his newly discovered planet after:
A) the Greek god of the sea.
B) the king of England.
C) his benefactor.
D) the Roman god of the underworld.
E) the father of Saturn.
Q5) ________ looked very bland in Voyager 2 photos in 1986,but as equinox approached in the 1990s,its disk showed belts,zones,and storms.
Q6) How might the odd tilt of Uranus have been produced?
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Chapter 14: Solar System Debris: Keys to Our Origin
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Q1) Discovered by the spacecraft Galileo,Dactyl is a satellite of larger Ida.
A)True
B)False
Q2) When a formal definition of a planet in the solar system was adopted,Pluto was reclassified as a dwarf planet.What characteristic of planets does NOT describe Pluto?
A) Planets orbit the Sun.
B) Planets are approximately spherical.
C) Planets have cleared the neighborhood around their orbit.
D) Planets orbit in ellipses with low eccentricity.
E) Planets orbit in or very near the ecliptic plane.
Q3) Describe the properties of meteoroids.
Q4) What role did Percival Lowell play that led to the discovery and naming of Pluto?
Q5) From its orbit,we now recognize Pluto as one of the largest members of the:
A) moons of Neptune.
B) asteroid belt.
C) Kuiper Belt.
D) Oort Cloud.
E) Zodiacal Belt.
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Chapter 15: Exoplanets: Planetary Systems Beyond Our Own
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Q1) Some type of catastrophe is likely needed to explain the highly tilted rotation axis of Uranus.
A)True
B)False
Q2) The Doppler radial velocity technique works best for:
A) planets whose orbits are along our line of sight.
B) planets whose orbits are perpendicular to our line of sight.
C) planets whose orbits are nearly circular.
D) planets whose orbits are very eccentric.
Q3) The ________ hypothesis was considered plausible in the 1800s,but is it no longer taken seriously.
Q4) Planets found in the habitable zone of other stars:
A) are all rocky planets, like the terrestrial planets in our solar system.
B) are all jovian planets.
C) include some Earths and super-Earths.
D) include hot Jupiters.
E) have been demonstrated to be barren of all life.
Q5) Around other suns,we have found Jupiters where Mercury is in our solar system.
A)True
B)False
Page 19
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Chapter 16: The Sun: Our Parent Star
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Q1) The area in the Sun's atmosphere located above the chromosphere (1,500-10,000 km)where the temperature rises dramatically is called the:
A) photosphere.
B) corona.
C) solar wind.
D) transition zone.
E) convection zone.
Q2) The speed of light is 3.00 × 10 m/s.If 2.00 kg of mass is converted to energy,how much energy will be produced?
A) 1.80 × 10¹ J
B) 6.00 × 10 J
C) 1.50 × 10 J
D) 6.00 × 10 J
E) 9.00 × 10¹ J
Q3) What physical characteristics change in the Sun over the 11-year solar cycle? To what is this cycle apparently related?
Q4) The Sun's density is about the same as Saturn's.
A)True
B)False
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Chapter 17: The Stars: Giants,Dwarfs,and the Main
Sequence
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Q1) If a star were moved 10 times farther away,its absolute magnitude would drop five magnitudes.
A)True
B)False
Q2) Procyon lies about 13 light years distant,thus its parallax is about:
A) 0.01".
B) 0.25".
C) 0.40".
D) 0.65".
E) 1.3".
Q3) The absolute magnitude of a star is its brightness as seen from a distance of:
A) one million kilometers.
B) one astronomical unit.
C) one light year.
D) ten parsecs.
E) 10 light years.
Q4) What types of observations are necessary to determine the absolute luminosity of a star?
Q5) All classes of binary stars yield the basic information on stellar ________.
Q6) Why must both parallax and proper motion be known to give transverse velocity? Page 21
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Chapter 18: The Interstellar Medium: Gas and Dust among the Stars
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Q1) When an electron in H changes its spin from the same to the opposite direction as the proton,it:
A) emits an X-ray photon.
B) absorbs a radio wave photon.
C) emits a radio wave photon.
D) absorbs a visible light photon.
E) neither emits nor absorbs a photon.
Q2) The most common molecule in a molecular cloud is:
A) methane, CH .
B) molecular hydrogen, H .
C) carbon monoxide, CO.
D) water, H O.
E) ammonia, NH .
Q3) What is the primary visible color of an emission nebula?
A) black, because of dust
B) blue from the scattering of light off the tiny molecules
C) blue due to ionized helium atoms
D) red due to ionized hydrogen atoms
E) red because of reddening by dust
Q4) How is 21 cm radiation produced?
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Chapter 19: Star Formation: A Traumatic Birth
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Q1) What kind of variable stars are pre-Main Sequence stars undergoing gravitational contraction and exhibiting erratic changes in their luminosities?
A) R Coronae Borealis
B) RR Lyrae
C) Cepheid
D) T Tauri
E) Herbig-Haro
Q2) What happens when an interstellar cloud fragment shrinks?
A) It first becomes opaque.
B) Density rises.
C) Temperature rises.
D) Pressure rises.
E) All of the above.
Q3) What is the force that keeps a main sequence star from collapsing on itself?
A) Magnetism
B) Gravitation
C) The strong force
D) Radiation pressure
E) Electron degeneration pressure
Q4) Why does a star's luminosity drop so much during the Hayashi track?
Page 24
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Chapter 20: Stellar Evolution: The Life and Death of a Star
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Q1) That brighter Sirius A weighs 3 solar masses,but the white dwarf Sirius B is only about one solar mass implies:
A) that white dwarfs evolve slower than main sequence stars.
B) that the collapsed companion transferred mass to Sirius A.
C) that there should be a planetary nebula around the Sirius system.
D) that Sirius A will be stable three times longer than Sirius B.
E) the Sirius A will end up as a black hole, not a white dwarf like its companion.
Q2) Give evidence that magnetism plays a role in planetary nebula formation.
Q3) For binary star systems where the stars are separated by more than 1000 stellar radii,mass transfer is not an issue.
A)True
B)False
Q4) What is peculiar about Sirius based on historical records?
Q5) The brightest stars in a young open cluster will be:
A) massive blue stars at the top left on the H-R diagram.
B) red T-tauri stars still heading for the main sequence.
C) red giants that are fusing helium into carbon.
D) yellow giants like our Sun, but much larger.
E) the core stars of planetary nebulae.
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Chapter 21: Stellar Explosions: Novae,Supernovae,and the
Formation of the Elements
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Q1) What role does the main sequence mass of the star play in the formation of heavy elements in the giant stage?
Q2) Compare the amount of time a 20 solar mass star will stay on the main sequence to the length of time its iron core can exist.
Q3) The spectra of the youngest stars show the most heavy elements present.
A)True
B)False
Q4) What is the amount of energy emitted in the form of neutrinos,during a supernova explosion,compared to the amount of energy radiated as electromagnetic radiation?
A) only .007 as much
B) about equal amounts
C) about twice as much
D) ten times more
E) 100 times more
Q5) Most of the energy released during a supernova is emitted as neutrinos.
A)True
B)False
Q6) What is the importance of 1.4 solar masses in stellar evolution?
26
Q7) What are two differences observed between type I and type II supernovae?
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Chapter 22: Neutron Stars and Black Holes: Strange States of Matter
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Q1) While most neutron stars are also pulsars,an older "bare" neutron star was captured in rapid motion only 200 lightly years distant by:
A) Arecibo Radio Observatory.
B) the Keck Telescopes used as an interferometer.
C) the Chandra X-ray observatory.
D) the Hubble Space Telescope.
E) the Spitzer Infrared Space Telescope.
Q2) A method for identifying a black hole is to:
A) look for voids in the star fields.
B) look for their effects on nearby companions.
C) locate a visible star that disappears when the black hole passes in front of it.
D) search for radio waves from the accretion disk.
E) search for their pulsar signal.
Q3) With what objects do many of the millisecond pulsars appear to be associated,and what does this tell us about their age?
Q4) Describe in detail the observational properties of a pulsar.From these properties,how is it possible to interpret it as a neutron star?
Q5) Contrast a hypernova and a type II supernova.
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Chapter 23: The Milky Way Galaxy: A Spiral in Space
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Q1) The period-luminosity relation is critical in finding distances with:
A) RR Lyrae stars.
B) trigonometric parallaxes.
C) spectroscopic parallaxes.
D) Cepheid variables.
E) pulsars.
Q2) The spiral structure of the Milky Way is best revealed by ________ cm radio observations of HI regions.
Q3) Which method relies on the mass of a dark object revealing its presence?
A) asteroidal occultations
B) ring occultations
C) stellar eclipses
D) temporary brightening of a distant star by a gravity lens
E) pulsars slowing down irregularly
Q4) The Earth lies close to the center of the Galaxy.
A)True
B)False
Q5) The Galactic center in ________ is best studied using radio and infrared observations.
Q6) Who discovered the period-luminosity relationship,and why was it so critical?
Page 28
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Chapter 24: Galaxies: Building Blocks of the Universe
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Q1) Quasar is short for what? Is this true of all of them?
Q2) There is very little interstellar gas or dust in most elliptical galaxies.
A)True
B)False
Q3) The smallest dwarf irregular galaxies are no richer in stars than the largest known globular clusters.
A)True
B)False
Q4) The elliptical galaxies are most like what part of our Milky Way? Explain.
Q5) To which portion of the Milky Way are the Magellanic Clouds most similar? Why?
Q6) Which of the following paraphrases Hubble Law?
A) The faster the galaxy spins, the more massive and luminous it is.
B) The greater the distance to a galaxy, the greater its redshift.
C) The greater the distance to a galaxy, the fainter it is.
D) The more distant a galaxy is, the younger it appears.
E) The older the galaxy appears to us, the more luminous it is.
Q7) Briefly describe how Hubble classified the galaxies visually.
Q8) Relate synchrotron radiation to the central engine of active galaxies.
Q10) Why is light variability a critical issue with the sizes of active nuclei? Page 29
Q9) What lines of evidence show that the Milky Way Galaxy is indeed a spiral galaxy?
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Chapter 25: Galaxies and Dark Matter: The Large-Scale
Structure of the Cosmos
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Q1) Why do we believe galaxy clusters are rich in dark matter?
Q2) Some quasars show absorption spectra with a smaller redshift than their emission spectra; this indicates that:
A) we still don't understand redshifts.
B) they are much closer than previously thought.
C) there is cooler gas between us and the quasar.
D) their black holes are still contracting.
E) their black holes are still expanding.
Q3) While our Milky Way's black hole is not massive enough to have once been quasar,it must have passed through its Seyfert phase by 3.5 billion years ago.Explain how we know this.
Q4) A red supergiant is observed in a globular cluster in another galaxy (located 150,000 light years away).It is predicted,based on its mass and age of the star that it will supernova in about 10,000 years.When will this supernova be visible on Earth?
A) 10,000 years from now
B) 10,000 years ago
C) 150,000 years from now
D) 150,000 years ago
E) 160,000 years from now
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Chapter 26: Cosmology: The Big Bang and the Fate of the Universe
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101 Verified Questions
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Sample Questions
Q1) The Big Bang was an expansion of matter into empty space.
A)True
B)False
Q2) The cosmic microwave background is:
A) redshifted in the direction of Earth's motion.
B) redshifted in the direction of the Sun's motion.
C) redshifted in the direction of the center of the Milky Way.
D) blueshifted in the direction of Earth's motion.
E) blueshifted in the direction of the Virgo Cluster.
Q3) If the Hubble Constant is 70 km/sec/Mpc,the accelerating universe is about 10 billion years old.
A)True
B)False
Q4) In our best current theory,the first quasars formed about:
A) 14.5 billion years ago.
B) 13 billion years ago.
C) 12 billion years ago.
D) 11 billion years ago.
E) 9 billion years ago.
Q5) ________ Paradox asks "Why is the night sky dark?".
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Chapter 27: The Early Universe: Toward the Beginning of Time
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110 Verified Questions
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Sample Questions
Q1) Pair production is how a proton and electron are formed together from two photons,with neutrinos also given off.
A)True
B)False
Q2) The critical temperature above which pair production can occur is called the:
A) Chandrasekhar Limit.
B) Cosmological Constant.
C) fusion temperature.
D) threshold temperature.
E) event horizon.
Q3) When new particle pairs are being created as fast as they annihilate,it is:
A) hydrostatic equilibrium.
B) thermal equilibrium.
C) the threshold equilibrium.
D) the cosmological constant.
E) the critical density.
Q4) At decoupling,the electrons and protons were made from neutron decay.
A)True
B)False
Q5) Regular atoms did not show up in the universe until when?
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Chapter
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105 Verified Questions
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Sample Questions
Q1) The ________ habitable zone is set by the activity of the nucleus on the inside,and the rate of star formation and proper chemistry on the outside.
Q2) An F-type star would have a larger habitable zone than does our Sun.
A)True
B)False
Q3) An extraterrestrial observer would pick up the strongest radio signals when:
A) the Earth was at perihelion.
B) North America was either rising or setting for the observer.
C) North America was directly in front of the observers.
D) at new or full Moon.
E) Saturday Night Live is on.
Q4) Why is the hypothesis that life on Earth came from outer space considered plausible?
A) because alien DNA is like human DNA
B) because organic molecules have been found in space
C) because many meteorites contain complex organic molecules
D) because Earth has had many collisions in its history
E) because Earth formed with the Sun from the solar nebula
Q5) What is the most important consideration in the "habitable zone" of a planetary system?
Page 34
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