Concept Summaries:

-​ H I/II regions: clouds in the interstellar medium of cold neutral hydrogen (H I) or hot
ionized hydrogen (H II). H I is the most common version of hydrogen in the interstellar
medium.
-​ Molecular cloud: an interstellar dust/gas cloud in which molecules are formed, the most
common being H2. They primarily radiate in the radio wave spectrum (very large waves).
Mostly found in spiral arms of galaxies.
-​ Protostars: The first phase in star formation, generally stars < 500,000 years old. Star
formation begins when a fragment of a molecular cloud collapses under its gravity,
creating an opaque protostar. Once the gas forming the star is depleted, it becomes a
pre-main sequence star and a main sequence star once it begins hydrogen fusion
(reaching hydro-static equilibrium).
-​ Herbig-Haro Objects: Bright patches of nebulosity (very dense gas); jets of plasma
ejected from young stars collide at high speeds with clouds of gas/dust, creating
shockwaves that form these colorful, luminous regions.
-​ T Tauri Variables: pre-main sequence stars (>10 Myr) found near molecular clouds. They
get their energy from gravitational collapse of surrounding material. Their spectra display
emission lines and large Doppler blueshifts. They come after the sun on the main
sequence of an HR diagram (bottom left). When looking at the spectra of a classic (class
II) T Tauri star, the series that you expect to see strong lines is the Balmer Series.
-​ Herbig Ae/Be Stars: variable pre-main sequence stars that will be of classification A or B
once they reach the main sequence. Characterized by an accretion disk. Much smaller
magnitude changes than T Tauri variables (less than 1 magnitude vs 3 magnitudes).
Usually < 10 million years old. They come before the sun on the main sequence of an
HR diagram (top right). They have a shorter lifespan than T Tauri variables so they are
less studied.
-​ Planet Formation: Planets form in the disks of T Tauri phase stars when small groups of
dust particles collide and amass. Terrestrial planets form in the warmer parts of the disk
closer to the star, while gas giants form in the colder parts further from the star.
-​ Brown Dwarfs: Incredibly small (typically mass > 13 Jupiters and < 80 Jupiters) and cool
stars, which don’t have enough heat to begin nuclear fusion. Instead, they fuse a heavy
isotope of hydrogen called deuterium (and can fuse lithium). Brown dwarf stars emit little
heat or visible light and emit most of their light in the infrared wavelengths. Brown dwarfs
 aren’t necessarily brown, but they are very dim and hard to detect. They are generally
about the size of Jupiter. They have spectral types M, L, T, and Y.
-​ Protoplanetary Disks: Rotating disk of dense gas surrounding a newly formed star (any
pre-main sequence star). As the star becomes denser, the molecular cloud surrounding
it transforms into a protoplanetary disk. The protoplanetary disk's angular momentum
flattens it out and resists the star's gravitational pull. The distance between a star and its
protoplanetary disk is measured with light echoes.
-​ A circumstellar disc - (or circumstellar disk) is a torus, pancake or ring-shaped accretion
disk of matter composed of gas, dust, planetesimals, asteroids, or collision fragments in
orbit around a star. Around the youngest stars, they are the reservoirs of material out of
which planets may form. Around mature stars, they indicate that planetesimal formation
has taken place, and around white dwarfs, they indicate that planetary material survived
the whole of stellar evolution. Such a disc can manifest itself in various ways. The Law of
the Conservation Angular Momentum describes why circumstellar disks form during the
collapse of a protostar.
-​ Debris Disks: Dust/debris-dominated disks, similar to the Kuiper belt in our solar system.
They are thought to be produced when asteroids or planetesimals collide and fragment.
-​ Neptunes: similar in size to Neptune (four Earth radii and 17 times the mass). Typically
rocky with hydrogen- and helium-dominated atmospheres, massive cloud layers, and icy
conditions.
-​ Sub-Neptunes: larger than super-Earths and smaller than Neptune.
-​ Super-Earths: Exoplanets that are slightly larger than Earth, with a radius of up to two
times that of Earth and up to ten times the mass. Exoplanets above the upper size limit
for super-Earths and smaller than Neptune are considered sub-Neptunes.
-​ Blackbody radiation: radiation from blackbodies (perfect emitters like the sun). Peak
wavelength is determined by Wien’s law. A higher temperature corresponds to a lower
peak wavelength and higher emissions in all wavelengths.

Stellar Evolution:

-​ Planets and stars in binary systems orbit around a barycenter

-​ Binary stars are believed to be the most common in the Milky Way galaxy
-​ Binary stars are said to have common proper motion when they move through space at
the same velocity.
-​ Planetesimals (pre-planets) gain mass through electrostatic attraction before they have
enough gravity to attract mass through that
-​ Planetary system formation: a molecular cloud forms, then partially collapses to form a
star—the remaining portions clump to form planets.
-​ The Hayashi track is a mass-luminosity relationship followed by most infant stars.
-​ Henyey Tracks are paths taken by pre-main-sequence stars with masses greater than
0.5 solar masses in the Hertzsprung–Russell diagram after the end of the Hayashi track.
(Pictured below)

-​ Hot Jupiters are gas giants that have very small orbital radii and quick orbital periods.
They form further away from their star but fall inwards towards it. Hot Jupiters were the
first type of exoplanet to be discovered.
-​ Low mass stars typically become red giants without ever fusing iron and then white
dwarfs. Higher mass stars typically explode into supernovae after fusing iron and then
turn into a neutron star or black hole.
 -​ The Roche Lobe is the region around a star in a binary system within which orbiting
material is gravitationally bound to that star. It is an approximately teardrop-shaped
region
-​ The Roche Limit, is the distance from a celestial body within which a second celestial
body, held together only by its own force of gravity, will disintegrate because the first
body's tidal forces exceed the second body's self-gravitation
-​ Rayleigh Scattering refers to the scattering of light by particles in its path of size up to
one-tenth the wavelength of the light and occurs without any loss of energy or change of
wavelength. Being wavelength dependent, this phenomenon gives us nature's blue sky
because of the increased scattering of blue light.
-​ Opacity is a term to describe how well a material can scatter and absorb photons. when
a material regularly absorbs photons (occurs to ionize atoms), it has a high opacity. Due
to this, radiation doesn’t work and x-ray binary convection takes over. The outer layer of
low mass stars aren’t hot enough to ionize hydrogen. Hydrogen absorbs photons in the
outer envelopes of low mass stars, making opacity high. radiation is ineffective, so
convection takes over. The outer layers of high mass stars are very hot, so hydrogen
stays ionized in these regions and doesn’t need to absorb photons. low opacity =
radiation. Convection is also dominant when the rate of energy production changes
rapidly (radiation can’t maintain balance). cores of low mass stars run on radiative
transport while the centers of massive stars are convective

Random:

-​ TiSo4 - only planets with life

-​ The absolute magnitude of a type 1a supernova is -19.5
-​ The absolute magnitude of the sun is 4.83
-​ The temperature of the sun is 5778 K
-​ The stellar difference in brightness = 2.512^(mb-ma); ma and mb are apparent
magnitudes. Answer in how many times brighter a is than b.
-​ The habitable range is 175 K to 270 K for exoplanets (0 C to 115 C)
-​ The mass of Jupiter is 1.899 * 10^27 kg.
Math + Concept Resources:

●​ Hertzsprung-Russell Diagrams
●​ Movement of a sun-like star along the HR diagram
●​ Elements fused during stellar evolution

●​ Periodic table of elements (for reference)

●​ Color index of main sequence stars

●​ Spectra of common elements

●​ Stellar makeup of the Milky Way (population II stars near center bulge
and older, population I stars in spiral arms, ‘halo’, and younger)
●​ Electromagnetic spectrum (wavelengths)

●​ Energy radiation in different sized stars

●​ Habitability is based on equilibrium temp and surface pressure (if
water is liquid then it is habitable)
●​ Parallax equation

●​ Kepler’s laws concepts and equations

●​ The eccentricity of an ellipse is c/a (focus / semi-major axis)
​
●​ Wien’s law concept wavelength peak (in nm) = (2.897 * 10^6) / T

●​ Periapsis distance and apoapsis distance (a = semi-major axis)

●​ Velocity of an object in elliptical orbit (a = semi-major axis)