Exploring the Cosmos - Degree Exam 2009 - Galaxies and Large Scale Structure
1. Which of the following comprise the oldest members of the Milky Way?
Globular clusters.
The Sun and other solar mass stars.
Type O stars.
Red giant stars in spiral arms.
2. What makes up the interstellar medium?
Open clusters
K and M stars
Gas and dust
O and B stars
3. How does the interstellar medium obscure our view of most of the galaxy?
It absorbs visible, ultraviolet, and some infrared light.
It produces so much visible light that it is opaque and blocks our view of anything beyond it.
It reflects most light from far distances of the galaxy away from our line of sight.
It absorbs all wavelengths of light.
4. How can we see through the interstellar medium?
By observing at high-energy wavelengths such as X rays and long wavelengths of light such as radio waves.
By using only the biggest telescopes.
By using telescopes above the Earth’s atmosphere.
By observing only the brightest visible sources.
5. Where are heavy elements made?
In none of the above.
In the Big Bang, when the universe first began.
In the interstellar medium.
In stars and supernovae.
6. What can cause a galactic fountain?
Multiple supernovae occurring together.
Winds and jets from newly-formed protostars.
A supernova occurring in the halo.
The combined effect of spiral density waves.
7. Compared with our Sun, most stars in the halo are
old, red, and dim and have fewer heavy elements.
old, red, and dim and have much more heavy element material.
young, red, and dim and have fewer heavy elements.
young, blue, and bright and have much more heavy element material.
8. The disk component of a spiral galaxy includes which of the following parts?
Globular clusters
Bulge
Spiral arms
Halo
9. What evidence suggests that the protogalactic cloud that formed the Milky Way resulted from several collisions among smaller clouds?
The stars in the halo of the Milky Way are organized into several dense clusters arranged throughout the halo.
The bulge of the Milky Way is surrounded by many globular clusters, just as elliptical galaxies are.
The Milky Way resembles an elliptical galaxy more than other spirals do.
Halo stars differ in age and heavy-element content, but these variations do not seem to depend on the stars’ distance from the galactic centre.
10. What two observable properties of a Cepheid variable are directly related to one another?
Its luminosity and its mass.
The period between its peaks of brightness and its distance.
The period between its peaks of brightness and its luminosity.
Its mass and its distance.
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