Expert: Tom Whiting - 1/4/2007

Question
can you please answer these questions for me? Thank you so much!!

1. what did Hubble include when he noted the light emitted from stars is shifting towards the red end of the electromagnetic spectrum?

A. the universe is expanding
B. the universe is contracting
C. the temperature of stars in increasing
D. the temperature of stars is decreasing

3. the fact that the position of the constellations seems to change throughout the years is evidence that

A. earth is rotating
B. earth is revolving
C. the sun is rotating
D. the sun is revolving

6. as the moon moves around the earth, a person on earth doesn't always see the fully lit side of the moon. This phenomenon causes

A. eclipses of the moon
B. phases of the moon
C. an increase in apogee
D. an increase in perigee

7. which one of the following planets would you expect to have a rocky crust and a dense core?

A. jupitor
B saturn
C. neptune
D. venus

10. why do astronomers use light-years to measure distance in space?

A. the movements of the stars makes it impossible to measure in earths units.
B. the speed of light is slow enough to provide accurate measurements
C. equipment isn't sophisticated enough to measure any other way
D. the distances are at great to measure in earth's units.

12. what happens during a lunar eclipse?

A. earths shadow falls on the moon.
B. the moons shadow falls on earth
C. earth moves out of the plan of the moon-sun orbit
D. the moon moves out of the plane of the earth-sun orbit

13. which one of the following group is in proper order from smallest to largest?

A. Mars, jupitor, pluto
B. saturn, mercury earth
C. pluto, jupitor, moon
D. venus, neptune, saturn

14. which one of the following statements about the moon is correct?

A. the moon is the closest object in space the earth
B. most of the moon's surface is covered by rocks with high water content
C. the maria are ocean areas on the moon
D. most lunar craters were formed by erosions caused by glaciers

15.  what two characteristics of a star are plotted on the Hertzsprung-Russell diagram?

A. brightness and temperature
B. brightness and age
C. rotation and temperature
D. rotation and age

16. we only see one side of the moon from earth because

A. tilt of earths axis causes causes it to face the same side of the moon
B. the other side of the moon isn't illuminated when it faces earth
C. the moon rotates on its axis at the same rate at which it orbits earth.
D. earth's gravity holds the moon in place so it cant rotate

17. what type of telescope detects energy that's outside the visible spectrum

A. refracting telescope
B. reflecting telescope
C. radio telescope
D. spectroscope

18. the path in which one object travels around another object in space is called

A. rotation
B. revolution
C. gravitation
D. orbit

19. what scientist first proposed that the sun is in the center of the solar system?

A. Copernicus
B. Ptolemy
AC. Kepler
D. brae

20. the unit light-year is measured of

A. brightness
B. distance
AC. time
D. temperature

Answer
Hi Casey,
technically, we are not supposed to "help" with homework
questions.....doesn't it kind of defeat the purpose of homework....that is, to get you to read the textbook and/or
review your lecture notes?
But since I am retired and don't get that many questions, I
don't mind helping...but only by direct contact at
bwhiting@velocity.net
rather than using the AllExperts.com website.

1. A...the famous "Red Shift" where a shift to the red end
means an obect is receding (blue would be approaching)...
this is also the famous Doppler shift.

3.  B. Revolving around the sun...if it was daily, it would
be rotation.  In astronomy, never confuse rotation...motion
around an axis...with revolution...motion around another
body.  These two terms are NOT interchangeable in astronomy.
6.  It's not "this phenomenon causes"....it's "this pheonomenon is...the phases.... B.
7. D. Venus is the only terrestrial type planet listed...
the rest are "gas giants"...all gas.
(Mercury, Earth, and Mars are the other 3 terrestrial type planets).
10.  D....the milage numbers would be enormous.
See 20 next.
20.  B..unit of distance; one light year = nearly 6 trillion
miles, that's 6,000,000,000,000 miles.  (see what I mean?)

12 A...self explanatory, except it's more correct to say that
the full moon passes thru the Earth's shadow.
13.  D.  (By the way, Pluto is no longer considered a planet...
Actually, it never was...we only thought it was, until hundreds of more bodies were discovered, making up what we now call the Kuiper Asteroid Belt....same thing happened to asteroid 1 Ceres from 1801 to 1850.  It, Ceres, was also
downgraded from planet to asteroid.  So the move is not
unprecedented.
14. A...(but really, none of the above...as there are some
minor asteroids that on occasion, come closer than the moon.
15.  A....plotted...brightness and temperature...from which
we can determine the age...roughly.
16. C.  Moon rotates once for every one revolution around
the earth....called "synchronous rotaton" and is not out of
the ordinary...most moons in the Solar System are locked
into synchronous rotation around their primary bodies.

17.  C.  in addition, there is infrared scopes, UV scopes,
X-ray scopses, and Gamma ray telescopes.
18 D  by definition.
19. A....I think...I'm not much on the very distant historical
stuff...only the recent historical stuff.  Actually there were
a few Greeks back 2000 years ago that proposed the idea,
but they were laughed out of town...and were considered
rebels...turns out though, they were correct.

Hope all this helps,
Clear Skies,
Tom Whiting
Erie, PA
bwhiting@velocity.net