10. THE LIVES OF THE STARS

Stars are born inside giant clouds of cool gas and dust. Such a cloud may contain thousands of dense blobs of gas; some of these blobs collapse under their own weight. Gravitational compression heats the gas until thermonuclear reactions occur. When the production of nuclear energy matches the rate of energy escape into space, the collapse halts and a main-sequence star is born. Eventually, the hydrogen in the star's core is used up, and the star flares up in last burst of brilliance before it dies. If the star is massive enough, it explodes, spewing newly-synthesized elements back into space.

Reading

Please read all subsections of each section below.

Online

1. Complete the Lives of the Stars assignment, due on Monday, 29 Mar 2010 at 9:00 am.

2. Review the lecture slides.

Joshua E. Barnes      (barnes at ifa.hawaii.edu) Updated: 25 March 2010 http://www.ifa.hawaii.edu/~barnes/ast110_10/starlife.html