ASTR 111 Toolbox

This is a collection of essential definitions, conversion constants, formulae, and skills that students are expected to understand and be able to apply upon successful completion of Prof. M's section of ASTRONOMY 111 at FSU.

Last modified 8/22/06. This document is not yet complete.

Graphing

Students shall be able to create and utilize graphs for analysis. You may find graph paper to print here.

Metric Prefixes

Name Abbreviation Value
............................ ............................ ............................
nano n 10^-9
micro greek mu 10^-6
milli m 10^-3
centi c 10^-2
kilo k 10^3
mega M 10^6
giga G 10^9
............................ ............................ ............................

Formulae

Name Formula Notes Text Page
............................ ............................ ............................ ............................
Wien's law lambda_max is 0.29 cm / T lambda_max is the wavelength of peak blackbody radiation; T is the temperature in K 76
Doppler effect apparent wavelength / true wavelength is 1 + v/c v is the velocity of the object; c is the wave speed - the speed of light for the Doppler effect in astronomy 77
small angle formula see Angle Measurement Lab
apparent brightness apparent brightness is proportional to L/D^2 L is luminosity, D is distance 443
Kepler's 3rd law M=R^3/P^2 M is the mass enclosed by the orbit (in solar masses), R is the orbit radius (in AU), P is the orbit period (in yr) 622
............................ ............................ ............................ ............................
stellar magnitude m1-m2= -2.5 * log_10(b1/b2) m1 & m2 are the apparent magnitudes of object 1 & 2, b1 & b2 are their brightnesses 445
apparent magnitude m=M+5log_10(D/10 pc) m is apparent mag, M is absolute mag, D is distance 445
............................ ............................ ............................ ............................

Constants and Physical Measurements

c (speed of light) 3E8 m/s

The absolute magnitude of the Sun: 4.83

AU (astronomical unit): 1.5E8 km

ly (lightyear): 9.5E12 km

pc (parsec): 3.3 ly which is 3.1E13 km

More are given on the back of the front cover of the text.

Definitions