A REVIEW OF THE PHYSICS OF STARS AND HEAVENLY BODIES

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

Background of the study

Aspects of astronomy have been popular topics in school curricula for decades. In the lower primary school, themes such as “space” or “the planets” have been used by teachers to inspire and fascinate students in much the same way as dinosaurs have captivated small children. Most cultures have a variety of stories to explain the events we see in the sky everyday. A paradox is that some of the most readily experienced phenomena such as day and night, the phases of the Moon, and the seasons can only be understood using complex and non-intuitive explanations. For example, a common way to account for seasons is to invoke the Earth’s varying distance from the Sun throughout the year, yet the real reason involves a combination of the Earth’s orbit, tilt and its spherical nature The Adelaide Plains of South Australia are the traditional lands of the Kaurna¹ people (Figure 1). Much of their culture was damaged by colonisation, particularly from 1836 onwards (Manning, 2002). Kaurna astronomical traditions are not well recorded, as the Kaurna “carefully conceal them [astronomical traditions] from Europeans, and even their own males are only at a certain age initiated into the knowledge of them,” (Teichelmann, 1841).

What we do know about Kaurna language comes predominantly from the records of the German Lutheran missionaries Christian Gottlieb Teichelmann (1807-1888) and Clamor Wilhelm Schürmann (1815-1893), who came to Adelaide on October 1838. In 1840, they published a dictionary of 2,000 Kaurna words (Teichelmann and Schürmann, 1840). Much of the Kaurna language was provided by local Aboriginal men, including Mullawirraburka (aka King John) and Kadlitpinna (aka Captain Jack), (Amery, 2000: 56).  Teichelmann continued working on the Kaurna language, compiling a manuscript of Kaurna vocabulary and grammatical notes (Teichelmann, 1857). Clarke (1990, 1997) published research on Kaurna astronomical traditions, but the identity of many of the stars remains a mystery.

We do know that in Kaurna traditions, particular stars govern seasons. For example, autumn (Parnatti) is signaled by the morning appearance of the star Parna. This warns the Kaurna that the annual autumn rains will soon arrive and that they need to build large, waterproof huts (Teichelmann and Schürmann, 1840).

Figure 1: Left: The traditional lands of the Kaurna people, South Australia, stretching from Adelaide in the south to Port Broughton in the north. Adelaide CBD in red, greater city in orange, and metropolitan area in yellow. Image: Wikipedia Commons license. Right: Topographic map showing the extent of the Adelaide Plains, following the Kaurna lands closely (green indicates low elevation areas while red/pink indicate higher elevation). Image: topographic-map.com.

Sun is an average star of spectral type having absolute magnitude4.8 and falls in the middle of the main sequence, Because of its close proximity to the earth, Sun’s image can be projected and a resolvable disk of high intensity makes it easier to study the solar structure in great detail which is not possible for other stars. Hence, Sun is the only star whose physics we can probe. Stars on the main sequence are those that have interior structures quite similar to the Sun. These stars must have great central pressures to hold up the enormous weight of their envelopes, and this central pressure yields a high central temperature. Thanks to the high central temperature, nuclear reactions proceed in the cores of these stars and they become hot and luminous. Direct observations of the interior of the Sun is not possible and most of the information available concerning the core of the Sun are based on hypothetical conclusions arrived from studying the surface and outer atmospheric features. It has been suggested that Sun and other stars may still have rapidly spinning cores left over from the time of formation. Also the structure of the outer layers is modified by the existence of convection, which is difficult to model. There has been renewed interest in solar interior because we can now probe it by solar seismology and neutrino observations. Sun is the only star for which such observations are possible and these observations have greater importance for understanding the physical processes of other stars.

AIM OF THE STUDY

This study is aimed at examining and understanding the physics of stars and their astronomical identification.

SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY 

A scientist is a consumer as well as producer of information as he/she acquires, manipulates, updates, improves and report information. Consequently adequate understanding of the information gotten from the study is necessary for the proper planning and improving of further research in this setting. There are several studies that concentrates on the specific subjects or fields in the area. The study of the physics of stars and their astronomical identification especially in developing countries has been a significant and eventful issue from last few decades. Therefore, knowledge about the information needs and seeking behavior of users could play a vital role in meeting their information needs effectively.

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