Study Guides for Astro 4-2 - Spr '24

I've gone through our text and my question bank and found the chapter and subsection within the book which contains the relevant material to answer that question. There are about 10 questions on a typical quiz, so you'll see below for each quiz a list of ~10 section titles, one line for each question. This is so amazingly helpful - Now you can really focus your studying time! In some cases, the relevant material is in two sections, separated by a "&. Sometimes a subsection is rich enough to have several of my questions drawn from it, so if you see the same subsection title more than once, that means more than one of my questions is drawn from that subsection. For most questions, the answer to the question is given explicitly in the section listed. But in some cases, the text doesn't address it well, or at all. So be sure to study the PowerPoints on that material as well. In some cases, the material spreads through the entire chapter, not a single section within that chapter. In other cases, the section contains all the basic facts, but you'll need to do some reasoning to deduce an answer not given explicitly. Again, consult the PowerPoints. So, like all good exams, there's a mix of easy, hard, factoid, and inductive reasoning questions. There's even a couple of extra credit questions floating around in my test bank. If you get one, there's no mark-off if you get it wrong, and you get a bonus if you get it right.

The textbook likes to title their subsections with a question. This is NOT the question I'll literally be asking you. That's a common, but wrong, assumption. Rather, this subsection has material which is most relevant to answering whatever question I do have. Again to be clear - the relevant subsection title name is NOT the literal question I will ask you!

Below, If you see lots of little black diamonds with white question marks inside of them, where you expected to see blanks, then the problem is probably with your browser. I had this issue. The solution is to make sure Firefox uses Western encoding by default. On the top line of your browser, click on "tools" and then navigate Tools > Options > Content : Fonts & Colors > Advanced > Fallback Character Encoding and then choose Western (ISO 8859-1). Then the black diamonds should go away.

 

Quiz #1                                                                 
   0.2 Using this in Learning
   0.6 Characteristics of a good scientist
     & 3.5b Does astrology have any scientific validity?
  0.8 General Principles in the Design of a Scientific Test
    & 3.4a How can we distinguish science from nonscience?
   0.3 The Real World
  0 Chapter 0: Science and Clear Thinking
   T my online essay "On Teaching"
   T my online essay "On Teaching"
   3.3b What are Kepler's 3 laws of motion?
   3.3b What are Kepler's 3 laws of motion?

Quiz #2
   S3.3 A New View of Gravity
   4.5a How do gravity & energy allow us to understand orbits?
   4.4a What determines the strength of gravity?
   4.5b How does gravity cause tides?
  4.4a What determines the strength of gravity?
   5.4c How does light tell us temperatures of planets, stars?
   5.2a What is light?
   5.2a What is light?
  6.3a How does earth's atmosphere affect ground observations?
   6.3b Why do we put telescopes in space?

Quiz #3
   14.1c What is the Sun's structure?
     & 14.3a What causes solar activity?
   14.2a How does nuclear fusion occur in the Sun?
  14.3a What causes solar activity?
   14.2c How do we know what is happening inside the sun?
   14.3a What causes solar activity?
   15.2a What is the HR diagram?
   15.1c How do we measure stellar masses?
  15.1c How do we measure stellar masses?
   15.1c How do we measure stellar masses?
   15.1c How do we measure stellar masses?
   15.1b How do we measure stellar temperatures?

Quiz #4
   16.3b What is the greatest mass a newborn star can have?
   16.1a Where do stars form?
   16.2c How does nuclear fusion begin in a newborn star?
   17.2a What are the life stages of a low-mass star?
   17.3b How do high-mass stars make the elements of life?
   17.2b How does a low-mass star die?
   17.3b How do high-mass stars make the elements of life?
   18.2b How were neutron stars discovered?
   18.3b What would it be like to visit a black hole?
   18.1b What can happen to a white dwarf in a close binary?

Quiz #5
   19.3a What clues to our galaxy's history do halo stars hold?
  19.3a What clues to our galaxy's history do halo stars hold?
   19.1c How did we learn the structure of the Milky Way?
  19 Our Galaxy
   19.2b Where do stars tend to form in our galaxy?
   20.1b What are the 3 major types of galaxies?
   20.2a How do we measure the distances to galaxies?
   21.3 Quasars and Active Galactic Nuclei
   21.2a Why do galaxies differ?
   21.2a Why do galaxies differ?
     & 20.1c How are galaxies grouped together?

Quiz #6
   22.2b What is the evidence for dark matter in clusters?
   22.4b Is the expansion of the universe accelerating?
   22.2a What is the evidence for dark matter in galaxies?
   22.2d What might dark matter be made of?
   23.2a How do we observe the radiation from the Big Bang?
   23.2b How do elemental abundances support Big Bang theory?
     & 23.2b How do elemental abundances support Big Bang theory?
   23.2a How do we observe the radiation from the Big Bang?
   23.1b What is the history of the universe in Big Bang Theory?
   23.3b How does inflation explain these aspects?
  24.1b How did life arise on Earth?

 

  Final Exam Study Guide

  0     Chapter 0: Science and Clear Thinking                                
  0.7   Pseudo-Science                                                        
    &   3.5b  Does astrology have any scientific validity?                   
  0.4   Scientific Method                                                    
  0.3   The Real World                                                        
  T     my online essay "On Teaching"                                        
  T     my online essay "On Teaching"                                        
  3.3c  How did Galileo solidify the Copernican Revolution?                  
  S3.4a How do we test predictions of General Relativity?                    
  4.5b  How does gravity cause tides?                                        
    &   4.4   The Universal Law of Gravitation                               
R 4.4b  How does Newton's law of gravity extend Kepler's Laws?               
    &   4.1b  How is mass different from weight?                             
  4.3b  What keeps a planet rotating and orbiting the sun?                   
  5.5a  How does light tell us the speed of a distant object?                
  5.3b  What are the phases of matter?                                       
  5.2a  What is light?                                                       
  6.1b  How do we record images?                                              
  14.2a How does nuclear fusion occur in the Sun?                            
  14.3a What causes solar activity?                                          
  14.3c How does solar activity vary with time?                               
R 14.2a How does nuclear fusion occur in the Sun?                            
  15.2b What is the significance of the Main Sequence?                       
  15.1a How do we measure stellar luminosities?                              
  15.1a How do we measure stellar luminosities?                              
  16.1b Why do stars form?                                                   
  15.3b How do we measure the age of a star cluster?                         
  17.2b How does a low-mass star die?                                        
  17.2b How does a low-mass star die?                                        
  17.3b How do high-mass stars make the elements of life?                    
  18.1a What is a white dwarf?                                                
  18.3c Do black holes really exist?                                         
  18.1b What can happen to a white dwarf in a close binary?                  
  19.2b Where do stars tend to form in our galaxy?                            
  19.1c How did we learn the structure of the Milky Way?                     
    &   19.1a What does our galaxy look like?                                
  19.1b How do stars orbit in our galaxy                                      
  19.4a What lies in the center of our galaxy?                               
  20.1  Islands of Stars                                                     
  20.3a How did Hubble prove galaxies lie far beyond the Milky Way?          
  20.1c How are galaxies grouped together?                                   
  21.3a What are quasars?                                                    
R 21.3  Quasars and Active Galactic Nuclei                                   
  21.3a What are quasars?                                                    
  20.1b What are the 3 major types of galaxies?                              
  22.2b What is the evidence for dark matter in clusters?                    
  22.2d What might dark matter be made of?                                   
 22.3b What are the largest structures in the universe?                     
  22.2a What is the evidence for dark matter in galaxies?                    
  23.2b How do elemental abundances support Big Bang theory?                 
  23.3b How does inflation explain these aspects?                            
    &   20.3d How does expansion affect distance measurements?               
  23.4a Why is the darkness of night evidence for the Big Bang?               
R 23.2a How do we observe the radiation from the Big Bang?                   
  24    Life in the Universe