Stellar Astrophysics problem sheet 1

PH3920, Dr. Stewart Boogert, Due Wednesday 10 am 9th October 2013 October 1, 2013
1. Sirius is the brightest star in the night sky, is has apparent magnitude of -1.5 with a peak in its spectrum at 290 nm and measured by parallax to be 8.9 light years away. Our sun is used as a reference star with absolute magnitude of +4.79 and a luminosity of 3.9 1026 W. Calculate the following quantities for Sirius; (a) absolute magnitude, (b) luminosity, (c) eective temperature, (d) and radius. 2. Given that our Suns luminosity is 3.9 1026 Watts. (a) What is the rate of change of mass of our sun due to nuclear burning? (b) Compare the mass loss to the total mass of the sun and what conclusions can you draw? (c) Calculate the total mass change of the sun due to nuclear burning if it is 5.5 109 years old. 3. Draw a Herzsprung Russel Diagram. On the axes of the diagram indicate the direction of increasing numerical value, horizontally; (a) eective temperature, (b) B V color index, (c) U B color index, (d) spectral class, (e) and peak continum wavelength. and vertically: (a) absolute magnitude M , (b) luminosity L, (c) stellar mass Mstar . 4. Calculate the total gravitational potential energy U of a gravitating sphere of mass M with a density prole (r) given by ( ) r (r) = core 1 , Rstar where Rstar is the radius of the star and core . First calculate the core density in terms of Rstar and M and for the Sun. Calculate the total gravitational potential energy of the Sun and compare this value to the total energy output of the Sun over 5.5 109 years as in Question 2(c). 5. Show that the time it would take for the sun to collapse if the pressure was instantaneously removed dyn is approximately given by R3 dyn = 2GM where R is stellar radius, M the stellar mass and G the gravitational constant. Calculate a value for this dynamical timescale for the Sun.