ASTRON C10 Chapter Notes - Chapter 2: Black-Body Radiation, Blueshift, Photon

• School: Berkeley
• Department: Astronomy
• Course: ASTRON C10
• Professor: Filippenko Alex

Document Summary

Electromagnetic radiation: continuous changes in electricity and magnetism at each point of space a. b. c. d. Gamma, x, ultraviolet, light, infrared, radio waves are all electromagnetic radiation of different wavelengths. Spectral lines visible as bright colors are emission lines. Spectral lines that appear as gaps in a continuous band of color are absorption lines. 2. 1 studying a star is like looking at a rainbow. A graph of color versus the brightness at each color is called a spectrum a. A very dense gas or solid gives off a continuous spectrum that changes smoothly in brightness from one color to the next. Nature of light a. b. c. d. e. f. Wavelength is the distance from one crest to the next. Frequency is the number of times per second that a crest passes a fixed point. All waves travel at c in a vacuum regardless of wavelength. Light also is a photon: a discrete packet of energy i. ii. iii.