Astronomy-105: Stars and GalaxiesLecture 1Outline of Last Lecture I. N/A, this is the first lecture note created for Astronomy-105. Outline of Current Lecture I. Sun and EarthII. The Scientific MethodIII. ConstellationsVocabularyI. Scientific TheoryII. ConstellationsIII. PolarisCurrent LectureI. Sun and Eartha. Earth: rocky planet with iron corei. Iron core is most dense. In the early systems of the solar system, the densest material of the planet was located in the middle of the planet. The molten iron in the core hardened. b. Sun: typical star, ball of hot gad, mostly hydrogen and heliumc. Sun is 100x larger in diameter than Earth.d. Volume of the sun is 1,000,000 times the volume of EarthII. The Scientific Theorya. Scientific Theory- an idea that proposes to explain observationsi. Scientific theories make testable predictionsii. If a theory is not consistent with new observations, it is modified or discardediii. Observe, theorize, predict, test, modifyIII. Constellationsa. Constellations- apparent groupings of bright stars on skyi. Stars in constellations are usually not physically associated.ii. There are 88 different constellationsb. The sky appears to rotate counterclockwise daily Polaris, the North Star, due to Earth’s daily rotation from West and Easti. Earth’s daily rotation from West to East causes most celestial objects to ride in the East and set in the
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