Chapter 11 Stars

• Properties of Stars
• Classifying Stars
– Hertzsprung-Russel
(H-R) Diagram
• Star Clusters
– Open and Globular
Clusters
 Properties of Stars
• Mass – The single most important
property that determines other
properties of the star.
• Luminosity – The total amount of
energy (light) that a star emits into
space.
• Temperature – surface temperature,
closely related to the luminosity and
color of the star.
• Spectral type – closely related to the
What can we measure directly?
The Easy Ones:
• Apparent brightness: a well-
calibrated detector.
• Temperature: spectroscopy
• Spectral type: spectroscopy

The Hard ones:

• Distance: stellar parallax, but the
stars are so farrrrr away…
The Apparent Brightness
Apparent brightness
• The brightness of the a star as it appears to our
eyes (or detectors).
• It depends on both the luminosity AND distance
between the star and the Earth.
The apparent brightness of a star is related to its
luminosity and distance by the formula:
luminosity
apparent brightness 
4π  (distance) 2

• The total energy in this cone is fixed…

• At a larger distance from the star, the same
amount of energy is spread into a larger area.
Thus, the apparent brightness of a star is lower if
we are further away from it.
 The Magnitude System
Apparent magnitude describes the relative brightness of objects as they
appears in sky.
A difference of 5 magnitudes is equivalent to a factor of 100 difference in
apparent brightness.
 1st magnitude star is 100 times brighter than a 6th magnitude star.
 A difference of one magnitude is a factor of 2.51 difference in brightness.
 The larger the magnitude, the fainter the object
 Objects with negative magnitude appear brighter than objects with
positive apparent magnitude.
Apparent magnitude mv of selected objects :
• The brightest star in the in night time sky, Sirius, is mv = -1.4
• The Sun: mv = -27
• The full Moon is -13
• Maximum brightness of
– Venus: mv = -4.7
– Mars: mv = -2.9
– Jupiter: mv = -2.8
• Large Magellantic Cloud: mv = 0.9
• Andromeda galaxy: mv = 4.3
• Faintest star visible to human eyes: mv = 6
 The Absolute Magnitude
A star’s absolute magnitude Mv is the apparent magnitude it would
have if it were at a distance of 10 parsecs (32.6 light-years) from
Earth.
– The Sun’s absolute magnitude is Mv = 4.8
– Sirius: Mv = +1.4
– Betelgeuse: Mv = -5.1

• Apparent magnitude tells us nothing about the luminosity of the

objects, but it tell us how difficult it is to see the objects in the sky.
• Absolute magnitude, on the other hand, is directly related to the
luminosity of the object. But it does not tell us how bright they
appear in the sky.

Astronomical Distance
Measuring the Temperature of Stars
Everything with a temperature emit thermal radiation. We can measure the
temperature of the stars or any object by studying the shape of their overall
spectra.

Black Body
An idealized perfect light absorber that absorbs all the photons that strikes it (no
reflection). It re-emits the absorbed energy through thermal radiation, with a
spectrum characterized by the blackbody spectrum.
• The shape of the blackbody
spectrum is always the same,
independent of its temperature.
• The peak position (in
wavelength) of the blackbody
spectrum depends only on the
temperature, independent of the
blackbody’s composition, or
size, etc.
 Spectral Type of Stars
• Spectral type is closely related to temperature
 Spectral Type and Temperature
The spectral features of the
stars are closely related to
the surface temperature of
the star because the
formation of ionized atoms,
the excitation state of the
atoms, and the existence of
molecules in the stellar
atmosphere strongly
depends on the temperature
• High temperature
 Ionized atoms
• Medium temperature
 Neutral atoms
• Low temperature
 Molecules
 Determination of Distance
Stellar Parallax
Knowledge of the distance to the
stars is crucial for our
determination of the luminosity
of stars…
• Current technology allows us to
determine the distance
accurately to within a few
hundred light-years.
• Hipparcos mission (European
Space Agency) measured the
stellar parallax of roughly
100,000 stars with precision of a
few milli-arcseconds. So, it can
measure distance of star up to
1,000 light-years away…

Simulation of Stellar Parallax…

 Astronomical Distance Units
• Light-year:
– The distance light travels (in vacuum) in one year.
– one light-year is 10 trillion (1013) km
• Parsec: parallax & arcsecond
– One parsec: the distance to an object with a parallax angle of
1 arcsecond.
– One parsec equals to 3.26 light-year.
– kiloparsecs: 1,000 parsecs.
– megaparsecs: 1,000,000 parsec.

Absolute Magnitude
Determination of Stellar Mass
Mass is the single most important property of a star. But it is also
difficult to measure…

The most dependable method we have for measuring the mass

of distant stars is Newton’s version of Kepler’s Third Law of
orbital motion (Problem 33, Chapter 4).

Recall that
4 2
p 
2
a3
G (m1  m2 )

So, if we can find

1. two stars (binary star system) orbiting each other, and
2. if we can measure their
• rotational period p, and
• semi-axis a of the orbit,
then we can determine their masses.
 Binary Star Systems
Binary star systems are formed by two stars that are gravitationally bounded,
and they orbit each other. Center of
mass B
A

True Binary Star System

About 50% of the stars are in binary star system. There are three categories of
binary star systems:
• Visual Binary: a pair of stars that we can see distinctly (with a
telescope) as the stars orbit each other.
• Eclipsing Binary: is a pair of stars that orbit in the plane of our line of
sight. The stars are not resolved, but we can see the effects of the stars
blocking each other in their combined light-curve.
• Spectroscopic Binary: in some binary system, we cannot see the two
stars, nor can we see their light curve changes, but we can see the
motion of the stars from Doppler effect measurement of the spectra.
 Binary Star Systems
Two stars appearing close to each other in the sky do not necessarily means
that they are a binary system.

B Line-of-Sight

If A and B are not

B gravitationally bounded with each
A other, then, although they may appears
to be very close in the sky, they do not
constitute a binary system!
 Visual Binary – Sirius
Sirius (in constellation Canis
Major) is the brightest star
in the night-time sky
(magnitude -1.4). It is a
visual binary system. Sirius
A (the larger of the two) is a
main sequence star with
spectral type A0, and Sirius Hubble Space
B is a white dwarf. Telescope image of
Sirius

Sirius A & B time sequence

White Dwarf
 Eclipsing Binary
About 50% of the stars are in binary star system. There are three
categories of binary star systems:
• Eclipsing Binary: is a pair of stars that orbit in the plane of our
line of sight, (measuring the time curve)

Animations source:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spectroscopic_binary
 Algol – Eclipsing Binary
Algol (the demon star) is in the
constellation of Perseus.
• Algol A: main sequence
star, more massive.
• Algol B: subgiant, less
massive.

 The Algol Paradox:

Why is the more massive
Algol A evolve slower than
the less massive Algol B?
(Next chapter).
 Spectroscopic Binary
• Sometimes only the spectrum from one star is
seen, the other star is too dim.
• Sometimes two sets of spectra can be seen at the
same time
• Sometimes more than two sets of spectra can be
seen
– Mizar is a visual binary system in the
constellation of Big Dipper.
– Each ‘star’ in the visual binary system is also
a spectroscopic binary!
 Eclipsing Binary and Stellar Mass
Measurements
Among the three types of binary star systems, the eclipsing binary
system is most important for the determination of stellar mass,
because
– Determination of the stellar mass requires knowledge of the
orbital period and distance (in real distance unit, not in
angular separation).
– Orbital period is easy to measure, but distance between the stars
is difficult to determine.
• For visual binary, we need to know the distance from Earth to
the stars before we can determine the separation between
the stars in the binary system.
• For spectroscopic binary, we can calculate the separation
between the stars if we know their orbital speed. However,
we can only determine the line-of-sight speed of the binary
system from Doppler measurement. If the orbits are tilted
with respect to our line-of-sight, then we under estimate the
orbital speed.
– If an eclipsing binary is also a spectroscopic binary, then we
know its true orbital speed, and can determine the separation
 Luminosity
To directly measure the luminosity of a star (let’s say, the Sun), we will
need to surround the Sun completely with detectors, which is impossible.
• We can infer the luminosity of the Sun if we know
– the distance to the star, and
– the star’s apparent brightness
Further more, we need to assume that
• the star emits energy uniformly in all direction…
Then we can calculate its luminosity by the formula:
Luminosity  4πd 2  apparent brightness

The total area of the sphere with a radius of r is 4d2

 Quiz: Which Star Has Higher Luminosity?
Star Apparent Brightness B Distance d
A 10 1

B 1 10

• The apparent brightness decrease as d 2

• The brightness of star A is 10 × 1 = 10
• The brightness of star B is 1 × 102 = 100
if observed at distance 1
The photons contained in box
 Star B is 10 times more luminous than A!
X A are spread into an area 4
times as large in box Y which
Y is twice the distance from the
star as X.
 Luminosity of Selected Stars
Star Distance Spectral Luminosity
[ly] Type [L/Lsun]

Prosima 4.2 M5.5 0.0006

Centauri
Bernard’s Star 6.0 M4 0.005
Gliese 725 A 11.4 M3 0.02
 Centauri B 4.4 K0 0.53
Sun 0.000016 G2 1.0
 Centauri A 4.4 G2 1.6
Sirius A 8.6 A1 26.0
Vega 25 A0 60
Achernar 144 B5 3,600
Betelgeuse 423 M2 38,000
Deneb 2500 A2 170,000
 Luminosity and Distance —
Chicken and Egg
Most of the time, we need measurement of distance to calculate the
luminosity. Howver, if we can determine the luminosity of an object with
other methods (independent of distance measurement, such as the
luminosity of supernovae), then we can derive the distance to the object
from measurement of their apparent brightness.

luminosity
d
4π  apparent brightness
Direct Measurement of the Size of the Stars
Except for the Sun, all the stars in the sky are very far away, and their angular
sizes (the size of the star as it appears to observers on Earth, not the physical
size) are all very small. Although the theoretical resolving power of modern
large telescopes (such as the Keck telescope with 10-meter aperture) is about
0.01 arcseconds in the visible wavelength, it is difficult to realize the full
resolution of the large telescopes due to atmospheric seeing effects.

Interferometry have directly measure the angular size of stars. Direct

measurement by interferometry can achieve about 0.01 arcseconds angular
resolution.
• The angular size of Betelgeuse was first observed using interferometry in
1921…0.051 arcseconds.
• R Doradus (in constellation Dorado in the southern hemisphere) is the
star with the largest observed angular size: 0.057 arcseconds.
– 0.057 arcseconds is equal to 0.000016 degrees!
If we know the angular size and the distance of a star, we can derive its
physical size
Size of star = angular size [radian]  distance
 Optical Interferometry
The technique of combining images from multiple telescopes to obtain
very high resolution images…Recall that the resolving power of
telescopes is fundamentally limited by the size of the telescope.
– However, it is not necessary to build a single telescope with sufficient
size to achieve the required resolution. Theoretically, multiple
small telescopes separated by a large distance can achieve the
same resolution of that of a single large telescope.
– The two 10-meter Keck
Telescopes at Mauna Kea are
separated by 85 meters
distance. When they are used
together as an interferometer,
the theoretical resolution is
equivalent to that of a single
85-meter diameter telescope.
– Interferometry is routinely
used for observation in radio
frequency.
 Betelgeuse and
R Doradus
• The physical size of Betelgeuse
(a red supergiant) is roughly
500 times the size of the Sun, or
4.6 AU (radius of 2.3 AU, or 345
million km).
• The size of R Doradus (a red
giant) is 370 times the size of
the Sun, or 3.4 AU (radius of 1.7
AU).
– If R Doradus or Betelgeuse
are placed at the center of
our solar system, then their
surface would extends
beyond the orbit of Mars (1.5
AU, or 225 million km).
Image of hot spots on Betelgeuse from
http://www.mrao.cam.ac.uk/telescopes/coast/betel.html
using interferometric technique.

Giants and Supergiants

Indirect Determination of the Size of Stars
Since the stars are so far away, we can only directly measure the angular
size of just about 10 stars by interferometric technique so far. However,
if we know the luminosity (from apparent brightness and distance
measurements) and the temperature of the stars, then we can calculate
their physical size:
Assuming that stars are blackbody
• The energy output of a unit surface area on the surface of the star is
determined by its temperature (Stefan-Boltzman Law)
• The total energy output (luminosity) therefore depends on the
temperature and its total surface area, which is related to its size.
luminosity  4πr 2σT 4
where r is the radius of the star.
• We can then calculate the size of the star by

luminosity
r
4π σ T 4
 Properties of Stars: Summary
• Mass range: 0.08 Msun to 100 Msun
• Luminosity range: 0.00001 Lsun to 1,000,000 Lsun
• Size range: 0.01 Rsun for white dwarf to 1,000 Rsun for
supergiants.
• Temperature range: 3,000 K for M star to 40,000 for O
stars.
• Properties of Stars
• Classifying Stars
– Spectral Type and
Luminosity Class
– Hertzsprung-Russel (H-
R) Diagram
 Main Sequence Stars
 Giants and
Supergiants
Clues to Relationships Between
the Properties of Stars
General trends of the stars…
• Most of the very brightest
stars are reddish in color.
• If we ignore those relatively
few bright red stars, there’s
a general trend to the
luminosities and colors
among all the rest of the
stars:
– The brighter ones are
white with a little bit of
blue tint,
– the more modest ones
are similar to our Sun in
color with a yellowish
white tint, and
– the dimmest ones are
Hertzsprung- Sizes scale 1 Rsun 10 Rsun 100 Rsun 1000 Rsun

Russell
Diagram
Since there appears to be a
strong correlation between
luminosity and color
(temperature), we put all the
stars on a Luminosity –
Temperature plot, and this is
what it looks like:

Properties of Stars shown in

the H-R Diagram:
1. Luminosity (log scale).
2. Temperature and spectral
type
3. Size
4. Mass of the main
sequence
5. Lifetime
 Hertzsprung- Sizes scale 1 Rsun 10 Rsun 100 Rsun 1000 Rsun

Russell
Diagram
Notice that…
• Temperature scale decreases
from left to right.
• The scale of luminosity is in
power of 10 (log scale).
• Mass increases from lower
right to upper left
• Size increases from lower left
to upper right.
 Classification of Sizes scale 10 Rsun 100 Rsun 1000 Rsun
1 Rsun
Stars in H-R
Diagram
1. The Main Sequence stars
• healthy stars, fusing hydrogen
in the core.
• High-mass, high-luminosity,
high-temperature, and short-
lived stars on the upper-left-
hand corner
• Low-mass, low-luminosity,
low-temperature, and long-
lived stars on the lower-right-
hand corner
2. The Supergiants,
3. The Giants,
• Supergiants and giants are
dying stars, fusing helium and
heavier elements.
4. The White Dwarfs.
• dead stars, exposed core of
dead main-sequence stars.
 Classification of Stars
Full classification of stars includes both spectral type and luminosity
class:
– Spectral type: OBAFGKM
– Luminosity Class in descending order:
• I: Supergiants
• II: Bright giants
• III: Giants
• IV: Subgiants
• V: Main-sequence stars
– The full classification of a star includes both a spectral type and
a luminosity class:
• The Sun is a G2 V
• Proxima Centauri is M5 V
• Betelgeuse is M2 I
• Sirius A: A1 V
• Sirius B: DA2 V