Cutting Edge Astrophysics Questions

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Wicked Pilot
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Cutting Edge Astrophysics Questions

Post by Wicked Pilot »

OK, here are some questions I need answered. I have been in the process of finding the answers, but I thought some of you might like to help answer them. They are:

1. What are the forms of astronomy currently in use? Examples would be optical astronomy and radio astronomy. What other means of observing the universe exist?

2. What is the complete composition of the solar system? Include all planets, moons, major non-planetary components (e.g. asteroids), and associated radiation and charged particle fields.

3. Where does the solar system end? What does the local neighborhood around the solar system look like (say, within 20 LY or so)? Describe the local motion of the sun through the Milky Way.

4. Do neutrinos oscillate? Based on the latest measurements, what fraction of solar neutrinos reache Earth? What becomes of the others?

5. What tools are avialable, both earth-bound and space-based, to observe the sun?

6. Based on the latest measurements, what is the level of "missing mass" in the universe? What components are there to this missing mass?

7. How many black holes have been substantially established to exist?
The most basic assumption about the world is that it does not contradict itself.
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kojikun
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Post by kojikun »

1. What are the forms of astronomy currently in use? Examples would be optical astronomy and radio astronomy. What other means of observing the universe exist?
Deep space radar telemetry, but thats a cover for the stargate program e.e

Theres al sorts of telescopes, that pic up every imaginable frequency, from microwave and radio to xray. Neutrino detectors can pic up supernovae neutrinos, and we can use gravity detection to measure where jupiter is (thats how they measures the speed of gravity)
2. What is the complete composition of the solar system? Include all planets, moons, major non-planetary components (e.g. asteroids), and associated radiation and charged particle fields.
We know it includes most every natural element, but by mass its like 90% hydrogen.
3. Where does the solar system end? What does the local neighborhood around the solar system look like (say, within 20 LY or so)? Describe the local motion of the sun through the Milky Way.
Sketchy subject. Oort cloud would be the best defining limit, but i think the heliopause is the end of the solar system. Tho you might also consider the areas where Sol's gravity is ineffective, so this would make the solar system a big multistellar system because of interactivity between local stars. But the oort cloud really is far enough.
4. Do neutrinos oscillate? Based on the latest measurements, what fraction of solar neutrinos reache Earth? What becomes of the others?
Oscillate how? Classically, a neutrino is a hard spherical particle (or point particle) which rules out oscillation, but string theory says that every particle is a little loop that oscillates at a specific frequency depending on the type of particle it is. The percent of solar neutrinos that reach earth is the cross sectionaly area of the earth divided by the surface area of a sphere 1 au in diameter. The rest go off in other directions.
5. What tools are avialable, both earth-bound and space-based, to observe the sun?
Same tools used to observe other stars, you just have to have very big sunglasses on. 8)
6. Based on the latest measurements, what is the level of "missing mass" in the universe? What components are there to this missing mass?
99% or something ridiculously large like that. Noone knows what the components are, because its missing. :)
7. How many black holes have been substantially established to exist?
Not many. A few tens if that.
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Post by Darth Wong »

<FUNDIE>Of course, you should realize that all of those techniques are fundamentally flawed because they do not take the evidence of Scripture into account and they rely on a materialistic definition of the universe which people adopt because they don't like the idea of an absolute moral code</FUNDIE>
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Post by kojikun »

And lets not forget that the conclusions drawn come from assumptions made and fitting the information into our world view, because clearly the universe isnt 13 billion years old :roll:
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Re: Cutting Edge Astrophysics Questions

Post by Durandal »

Wicked Pilot wrote:OK, here are some questions I need answered. I have been in the process of finding the answers, but I thought some of you might like to help answer them. They are:

1. What are the forms of astronomy currently in use? Examples would be optical astronomy and radio astronomy. What other means of observing the universe exist?
There are tons. The two main ones would be observational astronomy and computational astronomy. The Hubble has already gathered hoards of data that astronomers have yet to go through. They've already taken all the pictures; they now need to sift through them all. There is ongoing research in designing programs that take image input of galaxies and classify them appropriately.
2. What is the complete composition of the solar system? Include all planets, moons, major non-planetary components (e.g. asteroids), and associated radiation and charged particle fields.
This site might be useful:

http://seds.lpl.arizona.edu/nineplanets/nineplanets/

Given that a large portion of the solar system's mass is in the Sun, most of it would be hydrogen.
3. Where does the solar system end? What does the local neighborhood around the solar system look like (say, within 20 LY or so)? Describe the local motion of the sun through the Milky Way.
The solar system ends where the last orbital ends, Pluto. Of course, if there is another mass contributing significant gravitational effects to the solar system, that would be the boundary.
4. Do neutrinos oscillate? Based on the latest measurements, what fraction of solar neutrinos reache Earth? What becomes of the others?
Yes, neutrinos oscillate like every other particle. I'm not sure how many neutrinos "reach" Earth, but neutrinos have a mean free path of roughly 6 000 lightyears. So, they'll all reach Earth, but only a very small amount will actually interact with it.
5. What tools are avialable, both earth-bound and space-based, to observe the sun?
Mostly telescopes and satellites.
6. Based on the latest measurements, what is the level of "missing mass" in the universe? What components are there to this missing mass?
Roughly 60 to 70% of the universe's mass is thought to be in the form of quintessence or dark energy, which is accelerating the expansion.
7. How many black holes have been substantially established to exist?
No idea.
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Post by Gil Hamilton »

I'm pretty sure that they've never substantially established a black hole to exist yet. They've got good evidence that some do exist, but it's still pretty sketchy and has plenty of Ifs and Buts.
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Re: Cutting Edge Astrophysics Questions

Post by ClaysGhost »

Wicked Pilot wrote: 1. What are the forms of astronomy currently in use? Examples would be
optical astronomy and radio astronomy. What other means of observing the
universe exist?
As stated by others, there as many methods as there are bands in the EM spectrum (and then some). Infra-red (near and far), UV, X-ray and gamma ray observations can be and are made for astronomical reasons. Sub-mm (a field that requires some techniques from far infra-red and some from radio) will start to be very important soon. Gravitational
wave detectors with a chance of detecting plausible gravitational waves will start operating soon. There are also arrays of detectors that examine cosmic rays through detecting the Cerenkhov radiation they give off in atmosphere.
2. What is the complete composition of the solar system? Include all
planets, moons, major non-planetary components (e.g. asteroids), and
associated radiation and charged particle fields.
Er, one star, some planets (eight or nine, depending who you believe), a
bunch of moons, tonnes of asteroids, lots of radiation, especially around
Jupiter and from the sun, a certain amount of plasma and charged particles
also radiating from the sun, some spacecraft, satellites, about 500
abductees in a low orbit around Pluto.
3. Where does the solar system end? What does the local neighborhood
around the solar system look like (say, within 20 LY or so)? Describe the
local motion of the sun through the Milky Way.
It ends Beyond The Stars. Ahem. I guess a reasonable definition
would be something like roughly half-way to the nearest star, beyond which
the sun's gravitational influence would no longer dominate if the nearest star was of
similar mass. The Oort cloud, Pluto, etc are also all good. Until someone goes there, it doesn't really matter, and maybe not even then.

The solar neighbourhood to 22 light-years:

http://www.projectrho.com/smap07a.html

The sun moves around the galaxy in an orbit with a period of about 200-300 million years. The orbit, when projected onto the galactic plane, is approximately circular. There is probably an oscillating motion in the direction normal to the galactic plane, with a period of about 100,000 years.
4. Do neutrinos oscillate? Based on the latest measurements, what
fraction of solar neutrinos reache Earth? What becomes of the others?
It would seem so, yes. I think about a third of the electron neutrinos generated at the Sun reach us - the others oscillate into the other two "flavours" of neutrinos part-way.
5. What tools are avialable, both earth-bound and space-based, to observe
the sun?
There have been several satellites - SOHO, Genesis etc, and plenty of ground-based telescopes. Much current interest appears to centre on helioseismology as a tool for examining the internal structure of the sun.
6. Based on the latest measurements, what is the level of "missing mass"
in the universe? What components are there to this missing mass?
It looks like roughly 70% of the universe is in the form of dark energy, and 25% is in the form of dark matter. Baryons (ordinary matter) probably make up something like 5% of the universe.
7. How many black holes have been substantially established to exist?
None, as far as I'm aware. There is strong evidence for one or two.
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Re: Cutting Edge Astrophysics Questions

Post by His Divine Shadow »

ClaysGhost wrote: The solar neighbourhood to 22 light-years:

http://www.projectrho.com/smap07a.html
Alot of territory to conquer I see.
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