GABRIEL THIEL

2013

UNIVERSE AND OTHER

WONDERS In what world do we live?

SCIENCE

C O L E G I O A M A N E C E R Z O N A 1 2

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INDEX

3 UNIVERSE

3 GENERAL DEFINITION

3 ORIGIN

4 ORIGIN OF STARS

5 SPIRAL GALAXY

5 ELLYPTICAL GALAXY

6 IRREGULAR GALAXY

6 OUR OWN GALAXY

7 ORIGIN OF PLANETS

8 OUR SOLAR SYSTEM

10 HOW WE STUDY OUR UNIVERSE

10 NAKED-EYE OBSERVATION

11 OPTICAL TELESCOPES

12 STATE-OF-THE-ART IN OPTICAL TELESCOPES

13 NON-VISIBLE LIGHT TELESCOPES

13 CLASSIFICATION BY LOCATION

16 TELESCOPIC IMAGES OF DIFFERENT TELESCOPE TYPES

17 OTHER WAYS OF STUDYING THE UNIVERSE

17 MANNED FLIGHTS

19 UNMANNED SPACE EXPLORATION

21 IMPORTANCE OF ASTRONOMICAL STUDIES

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Universe GENERAL DEFINITION

From the point of view of astronomy, the universe is all

existing matter, energy and space considered as a whole.

ORIGIN

The most accepted theory about the origin of the

universe is the “Big Bang”. It says that all existing matter

was concentrated in a point of infinite density, and

received an external injection of enormous energy (I

personally believe that it was injected by God, as the

Catholic Creed affirms when saying “I believe in God, the

Father Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth”). This

energy impulsed all matter in all directions, and even

now, the universe is growing in size because of this. It

may have looked like this:

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ORIGIN OF STARS

Not all matter traveled at the same speed after the “big

bang”, so in some places, it formed bodies of high density

of helium and hydrogen that had more and more

temperature, as the pressure increased, until the atomic

nuclei began to fuse, relasing enormous amounts of

energy, perceived as heat and light. The oldest stars

began this process from 10 to 14 billion years ago. The

age of our own star, the sun, is of about 5 billion years.

They group in galaxies (groups of stars) with different

shapes:

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SPIRAL GALAXY:

ELLYPTICAL GALAXY

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IRREGULAR GALAXY

OUR OWN GALAXY

In the following image, we see the Milky Way, the name

given to the galaxy where we live. It was given this name

because it looks as if someone has spilled milk in the sky.

The text on the image speaks about “LIGTH YEARS” and it

is a very useful measuring unit when speaking about the

universe, because distances are so big, that expressing

them in normal units would present us with enormous

numbers. Therefore, we use Light Year which is the

distance traveled by light in one year. Remember that in

just one second, light travels almost 300,000 kilometers

(299,792.458 if you need the exact number).

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ORIGIN OF PLANETS

We already spoke about matter condensing into stars.

During this process, the matter is spinning like water

going down a drain, sending some matter away. The

matter that is sent away start to condense into solid

objects, and once their gravity is strong enough, they

grow into large bodies. Some of them become planets,

the less massive ones become satellites and the other

ones become asteroids, meteroids and comets.

The planets remain spinning around the star that was

being formed with them, in elliptic orbits, forming what is

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known as SOLAR SYSTEMS. We already saw the position

of our solar system on the Milky Way.

Following, you will see a representation of our solar

system, which is formed by 8 planets and includes also 4

exoplanets. One of them is nearer to the sun than Jupiter

and the other 3 are Pluto and two other farther ones.

The formal definition of an exoplanet is: a big rock that

does not have the ideal size to be classified as a planet

(more on this after the image) and its surface is generally

a mix of frozen gasses.

Our Solar System

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In August, 2006 the International Astronomical Union

(IAU) defined 3 conditions to declare a heavenly body a

planet:

It has to orbit a sun

It has to be a circular objet and keep that shape

His gravity has to attract almost every thing that

passes near it

The names of the planets than orbit around the sun are,

from nearer to farthest from the sun:

- Mercury

- Venus

- Earth

- Mars

- Jupiter

- Saturn

- Uranus

- Neptune

The exoplanets are:

- Pluto

- Eris

- Ceres

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HOW WE STUDY THE

UNIVERSE NAKED-EYE OBSERVATION

Humankind has always been fascinated by the movements of

heavenly bodies. Many of them can be observed with our own

eyes by just simply looking at the sky. The stars and planets have

regular orbits. Therefore, their positions can be predicted if one

observes them carefully, making annotations from year to year.

That is why Astronomy was the first formal science.

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OPTICAL TELESCOPES

The earliest known working telescope appeared in 1,608

and is credited to Hans Lippershey. It magnified the

image 3 times. Galileo heard of this device in June 1,609

and dedicated himself to its improvement. By 1,610 he

built a telescope which magnified 33 times. With this

telescope he discovered the satellites of Jupiter and

described their movements. He also proved the rotation

of the sun on its axis and established the Copernican

System, that said that the planets revolved around the

sun and not around the earth, as stated by Ptolemy.

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STATE-OF-THE-ART IN OPTICAL TELESCOPES

Using very advanced technologies, the Very Large

Telescope was built in the Atacama Desert in Chile,

chosen by its clean atmosphere. It consists of four

individual large telescopes, complemented by four

auxiliary ones. It operates at visible and infrared

wavelenghts. It lets the operator to detect objects four

billion times fainter than what can be detected with the

naked eye. It is the most productive ground-based facility

for astronomy, with only the Hubble Space Telescope

genrating more scientific papers among facilities

operating at visible wavelenghts. The following image

lets us see the Very Large Telescope:

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NON-VISIBLE LIGHT TELESCOPES

When it was discovered that there were many different

types of energy that could be detected coming from

space, different types of telescopes were built. The

following table shows the different kinds of

electromagnetic energy that can be detected by

telescopes:

Name Wavelength

Gamma ray less than 0.01 nm

X-Ray 0.01 to 10 nm

Ultraviolet 10 nm - 400 nm

Visible 390 nm - 750 nm

Infrared 750 nm - 1 mm

Microwave 1 mm - 1 meter

Radio 1 mm - km

CLASSIFICATION BY LOCATION

Telescopes can be also be classified by location into

Ground Telescope or Space Telescope. In the following

pages, several examples will be shown.

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VERY LARGE ARRAY RADIO TELESCOPE

Location: Socorro, New Mexico, United States

X-ray Space-based telescope named Einstein Observatory

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Near ultraviolet, visible and near infrared Space

Telescope Hubble

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TELESCOPIC IMAGES OF DIFFERENT TELESCOPE TYPES

The same heavenly body, seen through different types of

telescopes, can give different types of information, giving

us a better understanding of the universe. The following

collection of images illustrate this. Under each image, the

type of energy measured and the name of the telescope

is shown.

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OTHER WAYS OF STUDYING THE UNIVERSE

Besides looking at the universe, humankind also learns by

touching, weighing and sampling the universe. We do

that in our daily life, when for example, after looking at a

cake, we take a slice, smell and eat it. Following the same

principle, the exploration of our universe has progressed

by sending spaceships to space, the moon and other

planets in manned and unmanned flights.

MANNED FLIGHTS

People in space can learn a lot about themselves,

materials and the universe. There is no atmosphere to

distort the view of space and they enjoy the absence of

gravity, allowing them to make many experiments that

are impossible on earth. Also, by landing on the moon,

astronauts were able to bring samples of lunar soil to

earth, giving them the chance of studying them in depth.

In the following pages, several images of manned space

explorations will be shown.

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Astronaut taking samples of the moon

Scientists making experiments inside the International

Space Station floating in space

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Astronauts working on the outside of the International

Space Station. A very interesting tour of the inside of the

International Space Station can be seen here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=doN4t5NKW-k

UNMANNED SPACE EXPLORATION

Very important experiments can also be performed by

machines that land on other planets, such as the ones

sent to Mars. The Phoenix Mars Lander landed on Mars

on May 25, 2008 and was designed to study the history of

water and habitability potential in the Martian arctic’s

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ice-rich soil. The Mars Science Laboratory’s rover vehicle

named Curiosity landed on August 6, 2012. Its mission is

designed to assess whether Mars ever had an

environment able to support small life forms called

microbes.

Phoenix Mars Lander deck after deliveries of several

Martian soils samples to instruments. In the center and

right foreground is the Thermal and Evolved-Gas

Analyzer. On the left is the Microscopy, Electrochemistry

and Conductivity Analyzer.

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IMPORTANCE OF ASTRONOMICAL STUDIES

We certainly have very urgent problems waiting to be

solved on earth, but astronomy is helping us in many

ways, so it is not a waste of time. I will mention the

main ones:

- Our calendar.

- Much of today’s mathematics.

- Astronomy’s need for computational power drove

the development of many of the earliest electronic

computers.

- The satellite network that gives us communications

and other services such as GPS is possible thanks to

the fundamental knowledge of gravity and orbits

discovered by astronomers.

- Image-processing techniques developed by

astronomers now are part of the medical imaging

systems that allow non-invasive examiation of

patients’ internal organs.

- In sum, astronomy has been a cornerstone of

technological progress throughout history, has

much to contribute in the future and offers all

humans a fundamental sense of our place in an

unimaginable vast and exciting universe.