Infinity and Beyond(Stars and Constellations)

Saint Louis UniversitySchool of Teacher Education

Preschool Major Acela Bisana

Some Concepts to Fathom

asterismsastronomyastronomical instrumentsconstellationshoroscopeplanetariumskystars

The Birth of Stars

The Mythology of Stars and Constellations

Greek Perspective

Chinese Perspective

Varieties of ConstellationsThe Great Bear: Ursa MajorThe Lesser Bear: Ursa MinorThe Hunter: OrionThe Dragon: DracoThe Crow: Corvus The Chained Princess: Andromenda

The Winged Horse: PegasusThe Scorpion: Scorpious

The Big Dog: Canis Major The Queen: Cassiopeia

The Swan: CygnusThe Lion: LeonThe Harp: Lyra

Instruments Used to View the Stars

The Reflector Telescope

The Star Chart

Radio Telescopes

188- Element Adaptive Optics (AO)

High Dispersion Spectrograph (HDS)

Uses of Stars and Constellations

Religion

Agriculture

Navigation

Horoscope

Zones to see the stars

Sky

Planetarium

asterism- these are group of stars that are

within a constellation

astronomy- study of heavenly bodies

astronomical instruments-tool that are used to view and study the different heavenly bodies

constellations- group of stars that are seen in the night

sky

horoscopes -a diagram of the relative positions of

planets and signs of the zodiac at specific time/ an astrological forecast

planetarium- a model or representation of the galaxy

sky - the upper atmosphere or space where the stars, moon and visible planets are seen form the earth

stars- a natural luminous body visible in the sky especially at night

Protostar:The contracting cloud heats up due to friction and forms a glowing protostar; this stage lasts for roughly 50 million years. If there is enough material in the protostar, the gravitational collapse and the heating continue.

If there is not enough material in the protostar, one possible outcome is a brown dwarf (a large, not-very-luminous celestial body having a mass between 1028 kg and 84 x 1028 kg).

A Newborn Star:When a temperature of about 27,000,000°F is reached, nuclear fusion begins. This is the nuclear reaction in which hydrogen atoms are converted to helium atoms plus energy. This energy (radiation) production prevents further contraction of the star.

The Birth of a Star

Young stars emit jets of intense radiation that heat the surrounding matter to the point at which it glows brightly. These narrowly-focused jets can be trillions of miles long and can travel at 500,000 miles per hour. These jets may be focused by the star's magnetic field.

The protostar is now a stable main sequence star which will remain in this state for about 10 billion years. After that, the hydrogen fuel is depleted and the star begins to die.

Life span:The most massive stars have the shortest lives. Stars that are 25 to 50 times that of the Sun live for only a few million years. Stars like our Sun live for about 10 billion years. Stars less massive than the Sun have even longer life spans.

Greek Perspective

• Most ancient cultures saw pictures in the stars of the night sky. The earliest known efforts to catalogue the stars date to cuneiform texts and artifacts dating back roughly 6000 years. These remnants, found in the valley of the Euphrates River, suggest that the ancients observing the heavens saw the lion, the bull, and the scorpion in the stars. The constellations as we know them today are undoubtedly very different from those first few--our night sky is a compendium of images from a number of different societies, both ancient and modern. By far, though, we owe the greatest debt to the mythology of the ancient Greeks and Romans.

• The earliest references to the mythological significance of the Greek constellations may be found in the works of Homer, which probably date to the 7th century B.C. In the Iliad, for instance, Homer describes the creation of Achilleus's shield by the craftsman god Hephaistos:

• On it he made the earth, and sky, and sea, the weariless sun and the moon waxing full, and all the constellations that crown the heavens, Pleiades and Hyades, the mighty Orion and the Bear, which men also call by the name of Wain: she wheels round in the same place and watches for Orion, and is the only one not to bathe in Ocean (Iliad XVIII 486-490).

• At the time of Homer, however, most of the constellations were not associated with any particular myth, hero, or god. They were instead known simply as the objects or animals which they represented--the Lyre, for instance, or the Ram. By the 5th century B.C., however, most of the constellations had come to be associated with myths, and the Catasterismi of Eratosthenes completed the mythologization of the stars. "At this stage, the fusion between astronomy and mythology is so complete that no further distinction is made between them"--the stars were no longer merely identified with certain gods or heroes, but actually were perceived as divine(Seznec, 37-40).

Despite the many mentions of the stars in Greek and early Roman texts, by far the most thorough star catalogue from ancient times belongs to the Roman Ptolemy of Alexandria, who grouped 1022 stars into 48 constellations during the 2nd century A.D. Although Ptolemy's Almagest does not include the constellations which may only be seen from the southern hemisphere, it forms the basis for the modern list of 88 constellations officially designated by the International Astronomical Union (Pasachoff, 134-135). The influence of both the Greek and Roman cultures may be plainly seen; the myths behind the constellations date back to ancient Greece, but we use their Latin names

Chinese Perspective

According to Chinese ideas, the sun, moon, and planets influence sublunary events, especially the life and death of human beings, and changes in their colour menace approaching calamities. Alterations in the appearance of the sun announce misfortunes to the State or its head, as revolts, famines, or the death of the emperor; when the moon waxes red, or turns pale, men should be in awe of the unlucky times thus fore-omened.

The sun is symbolized by the figure of a raven in a circle, and the moon by a hare on its hind-legs pounding rice in a mortar, or by a three-legged toad. The last refers to the legend of Ch’ang Ô, detailed later. The moon is a special object of worship in autumn, and moon-cakes dedicated to it are sold at this season. All the stars are ranged into constellations, and an emperor is installed over them, who resides at the North Pole; five monarchs also live in the five stars in Leo, where is a palace called Wu Ti Tso, or ‘Throne of the Five Emperors.’

In this celestial government there are also an heir-apparent, empresses, sons and daughters, and tribunals, and the constellations receive the names of men, animals, and other terrestrial objects

The Great Bear, or Dipper, is worshipped as the residence of the Fates, where the duration of life and other events relating to mankind are measured and meted out. Fears are excited by unusual phenomena among the heavenly bodies.

The Constellationshttp://calendargirl3.tripod.com/stargazing/id1.html

The Great Bear: Ursa MajorThe Lesser Bear: Ursa MinorThe Hunter: OrionThe Dragon: DracoThe Crow: Corvus

The Chained Princess: Andromenda The Winged Horse: Pegasus

The Scorpion: ScorpiousThe Big Dog: Canis Major

The Queen: CassiopeiaThe Swan: Cygnus

The Lion: LeonThe Harp: Lyra

Instruments Used to View the Stars

The Reflector TelescopeDeveloped in the early 17th century by Niccola Zucchi and perfected later by Sir Isaac Newton, the reflector telescope is still in wide use today as the principal tool for studying stars. This telescope operates by bouncing light through a number of mirrors in a process called "folding the optical path."

The result is a short, fat telescope, which has better magnification ability than long barrel refractory telescopes. Reflector telescopes range in price from $250 to $5,000 and more, in 2010. What you can expect to see with a reflector telescope depends on the aperture size. A 4.5 inch aperture will show excellent views of the moon, other planets and even faint galaxies and clusters.

The Star Chart

Humans once used star charts to navigate while traversing the oceans. These star charts included all the directly observable formations in the night sky including constellations, clusters and the cardinal stars (e.g., the North Star.) Using these charts, sailors could tell where they were in relation to their home country. Today scientists using telescopes and other instruments are able to create detailed star charts, including stars invisible to the naked eye.

These charts are used not to navigate the oceans, but to navigate the stars themselves with telescopes. The detailed charts provide a record of galaxies and other astronomical objects and provide more accurate dates for celestial sightings and events. Star charts can often be downloaded free from universities with astrophysics departments.

Radio Telescope

While reflector telescopes use light to show details in the night's sky, radio telescopes use radio waves. These waves often provide greater detail and use computer telemetry to process very detailed images. One clear advantage of using radio instead of light is that radio captures an image that covers more than the entire light spectrum.

This allows computers to filter out harsh light, which can obscure the details of a star's inner workings. The result is not just a clear picture of a star's surface, but thermal images of a star's core and even profile images of a star as it burns. Telescopes like this are responsible for discovering sunspots and seeing other phenomena such as black holes and supernovas that are not visible by some other star-studying devices.

188- Element Adaptive Optics (AO)

Subaru’s 188-element AO system includes laser guide star technology, which allows observers to use a laser as an artificial star when there is no bright guide star illuminating an object-star. The development of the 188-element system was a product of continual improvements to Subaru’s earlier 36-element AO system,

which was designed, produced, and then made available to astronomers worldwide in 1990. The current 188-element AO system successfully passed its first test on October 9, 2006 and replaces the older system. This 188-element AO mounts at the infrared Nasmyth focus.

High Dispersion Spectrograph (HDS)

HDS splits light into its constituent colors with an accuracy of 1 part in 100,000. With this precision, we can investigate the evolution of elemental abundances by observing old stars,

as well as learn about the physical and chemical state of intergalactic gas from quasar absorption line studies. The instrument weighs 6 metric tons and sits at the optical Nasmyth focus.

Uses of Stars and Constellations

Religion

People thought that the Gods lived in the heavens and that they created them. Many cultures believed that the positions of the stars were their God's way of telling stories. So it seemed natural to recognize patterns in the sky, give them names, and tell stories about them. We inherited the names for our constellations from the Greeks. And they named the

constellations after their mythological heroes and legends. 

Agriculture

Before there were proper calendars people had no way of determining when to sow, or harvest except by the stars. Constellations made the patterns of the stars easy to remember. The ancient peoples knew for example that when the constellation Orion started to be fully visible winter was coming soon. Or they could look at the Summer Triangle to know when Summer or Spring were coming as well. The stars allowed farmers to plan ahead and form agriculture, and constellations made it easier to recognize and interpret the patterns in the sky.

Navigation

It is fairly easy to spot Polaris (The North Star) once you've found Ursa Minor (Little Dipper constellation). One can figure out his/her latitude (North/South) just by looking at how high Polaris appears in the night sky. This allowed for ships to travel across the globe. It allowed for the discovery of America, the spread of European culture, and civilization as we know it today.

Horoscope

Fortune tellers uses the alignment of the stars in order to read or study a person’s characteristics, behavior and even their future.

Where to locate the Stars

Sky: stars seem to glimmer and change intensity because these tiny points refract through the atmosphere catching dust particles and water vapor, causing the star to flash or twinkle

Planetarium: a theatre built primarily for presenting educational and entertaining shows about astronomy and the night sky, or for training in celestial navigation

Characteristics of Stars

A. Color and TemperatureIf you look up in the night sky, you can see slight differences in the colors of

stars. Like hot objects on Earth, a star’s color reveals its surface temperature. If you watch a toaster heat up, the wires inside glow red hot. The wires inside a light bulb are even hotter and glow white.

Stars are the same. The coolest stars, with a surface temperature of about 3,000 ⁰C appear reddish. The hottest stars, with surface temperatures over 20,000 ⁰C appear bluish-white.

B. Size

The stars in the sky all appear to be points of light of the same size. Many stars are actually the same size of the Sun, which is a medium-sized star. However, some stars are much larger and are called giant and supergiant stars. Most stars are much smaller than the Sun. Black and white dwarf stars are about the size of Earth. Neutron stars are even smaller, only about 20m in diameter

C. BrightnessThe brightness of a star depends on both its size and its temperature. How bright a star looks from Earth depends on both its distance and how bright the star actually is. The brightness of a star can be described in 2 different ways: apparent brightness and absolute brightness. A star’s apparent brightness is its brightness as seen from Earth. Astronomers can measure apparent brightness easily, using devices similar to those used by photographers. However, apparent brightness does not take into account how far away a star is from Earth. A star’s absolute brightness is the brightness the star would have if all stars were the same standard distance form Earth. This allows astronomers to compare the brightness of all stars.

Different types of stars have different temperatures and lifetimes. Cooler red M-class stars live a long time, while hotter blue A-class stars have relatively brief lives. These four pictures are actually four different views of our own star, the sun. Each false-color view highlights atomic emission in different temperature regimes of the upper solar atmosphere. Yellow is 2 million Kelvin, green is 1.5 million K, blue is 1 million K, and red is 60 to 80 thousand K.

ACTIVITIES

Activity 1(Polka Stars)

a. Pupils will then create their own constellations by connecting the dots that were randomly plotted on their papers that represent the stars.

b. After which, they would come up with their own names of their designed constellations.

Activity 2(Constellation Myth)

From the constellation that the pupils had created, the pupils will write their own myth that depicts of an original story of the birth or use of their own constellation.

Activity 3(Map the Constellations)

a. Pupils are assigned to observe the night sky for 3 nights and observe and take down notes of the constellations that were present in their observation.

b. Pupils will design their own sky map through a drawing using a graphing paper.

Activity 4(Research)

Critique a journal and/or an article about the new discovery of stars and constellations.

Activity 5(The Planetarium)

Have a tour in a Planetarium to explore and have a first hand experience in witnessing the stars and constellations.

Questions to Ponder

Essential Question:What are the things you see in space?

Unit Questions:What can you see in the sky during sky fall?What is a constellation?What are the importance of constellations?

Content Questions:How do constellations look alike?How do stars and constellations could be seen?Where should you see constellations?When should you see constellations?What do constellations indicate?

Class Question and Answer

References:

http://www.west468.com/works/constellation.htmlhttp://www.theoi.com/Cat_Astraioi.htmlhttp://www.factmonster.com/ipka/A0921899.htmlhttp://www.ianridpath.com/startales/chinese.htmhttps://www.bisque.com/help/TheSkyXSAEAndPro/stars_and_constellations.htmhttp://cseligman.com/text/sky/constellations.htmhttp://www.space.com/15722-constellations.htmlhttp://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/40047/astronomyhttp://subarutelescope.org/Introduction/instrument.htmlhttp://www.ehow.com/list_6571627_instruments-used-study-stars.htmlhttp://curious.astro.cornell.edu/question.php?number=340http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/images/results.aspx?qu=aliens&ex=1#ai:MM900283735|http://calendargirl3.tripod.com/stargazing/id1.htmlhttp://www.sacred-texts.com/cfu/mlc/mlc07.htm