General Astronomy Question Bank
Course Introduction
General Astronomy provides an introduction to the fundamental concepts and principles of astronomy, exploring topics such as the structure and scale of the universe, the solar system, the life cycles of stars, galaxies, and cosmology. The course emphasizes scientific methods used to observe and interpret celestial phenomena, discusses the historical development of astronomical theories, and examines recent discoveries in the field. Through both theoretical study and observation, students gain a comprehensive understanding of the nature and evolution of the universe and humanitys place within it.
Recommended Textbook
Astronomy The Universe at a Glance 1st Edition by Eric Chaisson
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15 Chapters
1442 Verified Questions
1442 Flashcards
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Page 2
Chapter 1: The Night Sky
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88 Verified Questions
88 Flashcards
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Sample Questions
Q1) If the Moon rises exactly at sunset, what will its phase be? Why?
Answer: The phase will be full because it is rising opposite the Sun. If the Moon is directly opposite the Sun in the sky, its phase will be full.
Q2) A lunar eclipse can only happen during a A) new Moon. B) equinox.
C) full Moon. D) perigee.
E) aphelion.
Answer: C
Q3) Why can many more people witness a total lunar eclipse than a total solar eclipse?
Answer: For a total solar eclipse to be seen, the observer must be in the Moon's umbra, a shadow only about a hundred miles across, while everyone on the night side of the Earth can look up to witness the full Moon moving though our shadow.
Q4) A light-year is a measurement of time.
A)True
B)False
Answer: False
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3
Chapter 2: Light and Telescopes
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111 Flashcards
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Sample Questions
Q1) If a light source is approaching you at a speed very close to the speed of light, it will appear
A) redder than it is.
B) bluer than it is.
C) brighter than it is.
D) fainter than it is.
E) lower temperature than it is.
Answer: B
Q2) If a wave's frequency doubles, its wavelength
A) is halved.
B) is also doubled.
C) is unchanged, as c is constant.
D) is now 4 times longer.
E) becomes 16 times longer.
Answer: A
Q3) The Sun's blackbody curve peaks in the ________ portion of the spectrum.
Answer: visible
Q4) What information about a star can be inferred from its Doppler shift?
Answer: The Doppler shift gives the star's velocity along our line-of-sight, either towards or away from us.
4
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Chapter 3: The Solar System
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109 Verified Questions
109 Flashcards
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Sample Questions
Q1) The heliocentric model was actually first proposed by A) Aristotle.
B) Archimedes.
C) Aristarchus.
D) Alexander the Great.
E) Hipparchus.
Answer: C
Q2) Mercury, with a higher eccentricity orbit, should change its orbital speed more than do Venus or Earth.
A)True
B)False
Answer: True
Q3) Contrast the densities of the terrestrial and Jovian planets.
Answer: Forming close to the Sun, terrestrials are denser, with iron and silicates as major components. Far out beyond the ice limit, the jovians are far less dense, with compositions much like the gases of the Sun.
Q4) All the jovian planets lie beyond the asteroid belt.
A)True
B)False
Answer: True
Page 5
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Chapter 4: Earth and Its Moon
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Sample Questions
Q1) The three most abundant gases in our atmosphere are nitrogen, oxygen, and argon.
A)True
B)False
Q2) The auroral displays occur in our ________.
Q3) What is the best description of the Earth's rotation over its entire history?
A) It has periodically reversed directions, as the magnetic polarity reversals show.
B) It has been constant over the entire history of the solar system.
C) It undergoes abrupt changes, as the magnetic variations show.
D) It has slowed down very gradually at about .0015 seconds per century.
E) It has sped up at about .013 seconds per century.
Q4) What is the primary source of erosion on the Moon? Why does change there take so long?
Q5) These are found on the side of the Moon that faces Earth, but not on the far side.
A) Highlands
B) Maria
C) Craters
D) Mountains
E) Valleys
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Chapter 5: The Eight Planets
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Sample Questions
Q1) The belts of Jupiter are best described as follows
A) regions of downward moving material and low pressure.
B) regions of upward moving material and low pressure.
C) regions of upward moving material and high pressure.
D) regions of downward moving material and high pressure.
E) turbulent regions with no organized circulation pattern.
Q2) The greenhouse effect on Venus is due to ________ in its atmosphere.
Q3) Life is thought to be unlikely in subsurface oceans, such as those in Europa, because sunlight does not reach these oceans.
A)True
B)False
Q4) Which statements about the magnetic fields of Uranus and Neptune is FALSE?
A) Neither fits the Dynamo model very well.
B) Uranus' field is tilted 60 degrees off its already tilted rotational axis.
C) Neptune's field is tilted 47 degrees to its more conventional rotational axis.
D) Both pass directly through the cores of their planets, like all other fields.
E) Both may have ammonia water replacing the liquid metallic hydrogen.
Q5) Compared to Jupiter, Saturn's upper atmosphere is notably lacking in the element
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Chapter 6: Small Bodies in the Solar System
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Sample Questions
Q1) The lakes on Titan are almost pure methane.
A)True
B)False
Q2) The atmosphere of Titan is composed mostly of
A) oxygen.
B) methane.
C) carbon dioxide.
D) hydrogen.
E) nitrogen.
Q3) Pluto's bulk density is
A) 3,400 kg/m³, comparable to our Moon's.
B) 2,100 kg/m³, similar to Callisto's mix of rock and ice.
C) 1,200 kg/m³, like Mimas, made of almost pure ice.
D) 700 kg/m³, like Saturn a mix of hydrogen and helium slush.
E) 400 kg/m³, like Comet Halley's nucleus, a ice ball with many gas pockets.
Q4) In what two ways is Titan's atmosphere like our own? Now name two differences.
Q5) Why is Titan considered so interesting?
Q6) The moon with an atmosphere denser than ours is ________.
Q7) The moons of Uranus are darker than those of Saturn, due to ________.
Q8) Why were the mass and density of Pluto unknown until Charon was found?
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Chapter 7: Formation of Planetary Systems
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Sample Questions
Q1) Extrasolar planets are placed in groups by their approximate masses. What are four of these classes?
Q2) What support for the solar nebula theory has come from observations of nearby young stars?
Q3) Concerning our solar nebula theory, the presence of so many "hot Jupiters" gives us problems with how they can form that close to their star.
A)True
B)False
Q4) Different temperatures within the solar nebula ultimately determined the compositions of the planets and their moons.
A)True
B)False
Q5) The Kepler mission uses the ________ technique to detect exoplanets.
Q6) The asteroids are very young and appear to be made from the same material. A)True
B)False
Q7) Discuss the important features that allow space-based telescopes to search for transiting exoplanets.
Q8) What is the role of dust in the condensation theory?
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Chapter 8: The Sun
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Sample Questions
Q1) The speed of light is 3.00 × 10 m/s. If 2.00 kg of mass is converted to energy, how much energy will be produced?
A) 1.80 × 10¹ J
B) 6.00 × 10 J
C) 1.50 × 10 J
D) 6.00 × 10 J
E) 9.00 × 10¹ J
Q2) During a period of high solar activity, the corona A) disappears.
B) is more irregular.
C) cools almost to the temperature of the photosphere.
D) becomes smooth and even.
E) shrinks to half its normal size.
Q3) How does solar luminosity vary during the sunspot cycle?
Q4) The luminosity of the Sun is a measure of
A) the energy received by the Sun on Earth's surface.
B) the energy received by the Sun at the location of Earth.
C) the energy received by the Sun at any location in the solar system.
D) the energy emitted by the Sun at the photosphere.
E) the total energy emitted by the Sun in all directions.
Page 10
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Chapter 9: Measuring the Stars
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Sample Questions
Q1) In a spectroscopic binary system, the star showing the larger blue shift is
A) cooler and receding the fastest.
B) less massive of the pair and receding slower.
C) more massive and approaching us.
D) less massive and approaching us at this moment.
E) hotter and receding faster.
Q2) Explain how the shifting spectral lines of spectroscopic binaries let us find their periods.
Q3) Having nothing to do with trigonometry, ________ parallaxes use the width of absorption lines to estimate the star's luminosity and size and distance.
A) bolometric
B) photometric
C) spectroscopic
D) holographic
E) videometric
Q4) Why is the main sequence main? Why are these stars so common?
Q5) On the main sequence on an H-R diagram, our Sun lies at about ________.
Q6) In a large sampling of stars, the largest group represented in the H-R diagram will be the main sequence stars. Why are they so common?
Page 11
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Chapter 10: Star Formation and Evolution
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Sample Questions
Q1) What element are most white dwarfs primarily made of? Why?
Q2) A solar mass star will evolve off the main sequence when
A) it completely runs out of hydrogen.
B) it expels a planetary nebula to cool off and release radiation.
C) it explodes as a violent nova.
D) it builds up a core of inert helium.
E) it loses all its neutrinos, so fusion must cease.
Q3) Contrast the brightest stars of young open and old globular clusters.
Q4) If the initial interstellar cloud in star formation has a mass sufficient to form hundreds of stars, how does a single star form from it?
A) One star forms at its center and blows the rest of the matter back into space.
B) The cloud fragments into smaller clouds and forms many stars at one time.
C) One star forms and the rest of the matter goes into making planets, moons, and other objects of a solar system.
D) The cloud is disrupted by rotation so that it reduces its mass down to that of a typical star.
E) A supernova blows the cloud up and dissipates the majority of the gas.
Q5) When a low-mass star runs out of hydrogen in its core, it gets brighter. Why?
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Chapter 11: Stellar Explosions
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Sample Questions
Q1) What is the importance of 1.4 solar masses in stellar evolution?
Q2) What is the importance of 1.4 solar masses in stellar evolution?
Q3) Because they all involve the detonation of a carbon-rich white dwarf at Chandrasekhar's limit, all type I supernovae are equally luminous.
A)True
B)False
Q4) Gamma-ray bursts seem to come primarily from neutron star binaries in the plane of our own Milky Way Galaxy.
A)True
B)False
Q5) The supernova of 1054 AD produced
A) a remnant still visible to the naked eye, the Crab Nebula, M-1.
B) a pulsar with a period of 33 milliseconds, visible optically.
C) the closest known neutron star to our Sun.
D) the most famous black hole.
E) no remaining visible trace, as it was a type I supernova.
Q6) Contrast the progenitors of a Type I and a Type II supernova.
Q7) What would be most likely to disrupt the normal evolution of a star? Give examples of this.
Page 13
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Chapter 12: Black Holes
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Sample Questions
Q1) What can we detect from matter that has crossed an event horizon?
A) Gamma-ray bursts
B) Radio waves if the matter was traveling fast enough
C) Visible light
D) X-rays if the matter was dense
E) Nothing
Q2) The largest known black holes
A) create the dark nebulae in the plane of the Milky Way.
B) can be no more than 1.4 solar masses, according to Chandrasekhar.
C) lie in the cores of the most massive galaxies.
D) can be no bigger than a small city, just like neutron stars.
E) can be no bigger than the Earth, like white dwarfs.
Q3) If a specially designed space probe reaches the event horizon of a black hole, an observer watching the clock on this probe from a safe distance would see
A) the clock slow down.
B) the clock speed up.
C) the clock keep time in sync with the observer's clock.
D) the time on the clock would appear to change randomly.
Q4) Describe the properties of space in the vicinity of a black hole.
Q5) Something falling into a black hole will be ________ by tides.
Page 14
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Chapter 13: The Milky Way Galaxy
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Sample Questions
Q1) Which is the correct description for the Sun's location in the Galaxy?
A) At the outer edge of the bulge, but along the Galactic equator
B) About 30,000 ly out in the halo
C) At the very outer edge of the disk, but in the Galactic plane
D) In the disk near the Galactic center
E) In the disk, and about half way out from the center
Q2) Detailed measurements of the disk and central bulge region of our Galaxy suggest our Milky Way is a
A) dwarf galaxy.
B) spiral galaxy.
C) very flat elliptical galaxy.
D) very dusty irregular galaxy.
E) quasar.
Q3) Which of the following is most like the rotation of stars in the disk of the Milky Way?
A) A DVD in a player
B) The planets in our solar system
C) Cars moving at a constant speed on a circular race track
D) The hands of an analog clock
E) The tire of a car moving
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Page 15
Chapter 14: Galaxies
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Sample Questions
Q1) The energy source for active galactic nuclei is probably a(n) ________ around a supermassive black hole.
Q2) Contrast the results of a collision between two spiral galaxies on their stars and their gas and dust clouds.
Q3) From studies of the masses of individual galaxies and the masses of clusters of galaxies, it is now apparent that up to ________ of the universe is composed of dark matter.
Q4) Quasar's spectral lines are
A) emission lines with large red shifts.
B) a continuum from the synchrotron radiation.
C) fuzzy absorption lines from the merged light of the billions of stars.
D) too complex for any interpretation.
E) nonexistent, the gas so hot as to be totally ionized, so no lines are seen.
Q5) What is TRUE of spiral galaxies?
A) They are much less common at larger redshifts.
B) They are relatively rare in regions of high galaxy density.
C) They are only found in the center of rich galaxy clusters.
D) They have never been seen to have large redshifts.
E) They evolve from giant ellipticals.
Q6) Why is light variability a critical issue with the sizes of active nuclei?
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Chapter 15: Cosmology and the Universe
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Sample Questions
Q1) In which of the following models will the universe stop expanding?
A) High Density Universe
B) Low Density Universe
C) Steady State Universe
D) Critical Density Universe
E) Euclidean Universe
Q2) The discovery of the cosmic microwave background was important because
A) it established a firm center of the Universe.
B) it was experimental verification of a prediction from the Big Bang theory.
C) it proved that astronomy at radio wavelengths was possible.
D) its detection was a major advance in microwave testing.
E) it showed the universe must be closed, with more than the critical density here.
Q3) Which of these seems the best present answer to the flatness problem?
A) The superforce rules creation.
B) Dark Energy speeds the universe on out to infinity.
C) Symmetry in creation of particles and antiparticles
D) The inflationary epoch
E) The GUT theory
Q4) Does the universe have an edge or a center?
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