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Astronomy for Kids
Test Your Astronomy Knowledge
So you think you know a lot about astronomy? Take this little test and find out. Do not scroll down to the answers until you have answered all five questions.
Question #1: One of the following is NOT a type of telescope. Which one?
A. Herschelian
B. Copernican
C. Gregorian
D. Newtonian
Question #2: What would be the magnification of a refractor telescope if the main objective lens had a focal length of 1200mm and the eyepiece had a focal length of 30mm?
A. 36x
B. 400x
C. 360x
D. 40x
Question #3: Only one of the following is a type of eye piece design. Which one?
A. Monocentric
B. Planocentric
C. Egocentric
D. Orthocentric
Question #4: You cannot see the Aurora Borealis in the Southern Hemisphere. True or False?
Question #5: If you are going to take extended exposure photographs of the sky, which mount is the best one to use?
A. Transit
B. Altazimuth
C. Equatorial
D. Dobsonian
Test Answers:
Question #1: The correct answer is B, Copernican. Nicolaus Copernicus was an astronomer, but no telescope was named after him.
Question #2: The correct answer is D, 40x. You calculate the magnification of a telescope by dividing the focal length of the lens or mirror by the focal length of the eye piece.
Question #3: The correct answer is A, Monocentric. Three glass elements are cemented together to make a monocentric eye piece.
Question #4: The correct answer is true. The word "Borealis" means northern. In the southern hemisphere, Aurora Australis is visible.
Question #5: The correct answer is C, Equatorial. An equatorial has to be driven by only one axis to track stars as the earth rotates.
So how did you do on this little test? If you answered three of the five questions correctly, you beat the average. If you answered fewer than three questions correctly, perhaps you should either study or take up another hobby.
See Also:
Enjoy Saturn!
The Stars
The Planet Mercury
The planet Mercury is the smallest planet in our solar system, and the one that is closest to the sun. This proximity to the sun has made it difficult to study the planet. The closest look that we have ever had was in 1974 and 1975 when the unmanned Mariner 10 was sent to map the surface of Mercury. Only about 40% to 45% of the surface was actually mapped.
Mercury resembles our moon in appearance as it is heavily cratered. There is an atmosphere of sorts on Mercury but not one that would sustain life as we know it. The atmosphere is very unstable and is made up of hydrogen, helium, oxygen, sodium, calcium and potassium.
Records of studies made of Mercury date back to 300 BC. The name "Mercury" was given to the planet by the Romans after the god Mercurius. Chinese, Korean, Japanese, and Vietnamese cultures refer to Mercury as the water star based on the Five Elements. Other cultures have called the planet by other names. The Babylonians, for example, called the planet Nabu or Nebu after the messenger to the Gods in their mythology.
The temperature on Mercury varies. The average temperature is 179° C, but the extremes are a low of -183 °C to a high of 427° C. Sunlight on Mercury is six and a half times stronger than it is on Earth.
There is evidence that water does exist on Mercury despite the extreme temperature variations. The bottoms of some of the deepest craters near the poles are never exposed to direct sunlight. Temperatures in these areas remain far lower than the global average, so it is possible for ice to exist. |
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More articles:
A Second Earth in Our Solar System [Life On Other Planets]
Galileo Galilei - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
A Guide to Buying a Dobsonian Telescope
Telescopes for Beginners - Choosing a Beginners Telescope
Space Debris May be Catastrophic to Future Missions (and Google ...
The Moon Shot
Our Sun
There is nothing remarkable about our sun in the scheme of things. It is very similar to millions of other stars (and our sun is a star) in the universe. You might even call our sun an "average" star.
The energy source for our sun is nuclear fusion. If the total energy output of the sun for just one second could be captured, it would provide the United States with enough energy at the current level of usage for nine million years.
There is a hard core at the center of the sun. The core is so dense and the sun is so large that energy released in the center of the sun takes 50 million years to reach the surface. That means that if the sun suddenly stopped producing any energy at all at the core today, it would be another 50 million years before we noticed it here on earth.
Our sun has been producing radiant and thermal energy for the last four or five billion years. There is enough hydrogen for it to continue producing energy for at least another hundred billion years. In about 10-20 billion years, the sun will begin to expand. It will engulf the closest planets (including Earth), and then it will be a giant red star. In another few billion years after that, our sun will become what is known as a dwarf star.
Most people think of the sun as this large (huge), constant featureless fireball in the sky. The large part is right, but the constant (or steady) and the featureless parts are all wrong. Sunspots are a feature of the sun that was first noted by Theophrastus about 325 BC. A moderate-size sunspot is about the size of Earth. Sunspots come and go over a period of days or weeks.
Related Topics: The Planet Saturn,
The Planet Saturn, The Moon Shot
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