Table of Contents
What are the basic compositions of star?
Stars are made of very hot gas. This gas is mostly hydrogen and helium, which are the two lightest elements. Stars shine by burning hydrogen into helium in their cores, and later in their lives create heavier elements.
How do you determine the composition of a star?
The most common method astronomers use to determine the composition of stars, planets, and other objects is spectroscopy. Today, this process uses instruments with a grating that spreads out the light from an object by wavelength. This spread-out light is called a spectrum.
What is the chemical composition of most star?
The majority of these stars are described as being main sequence, which means their cores are fusing hydrogen to create helium. The Sun is a main sequence star and its chemical composition mainly consists of hydrogen and helium with trace amounts of other elements.
What material is a star made of?
hydrogen
Basically, stars are big exploding balls of gas, mostly hydrogen and helium. Our nearest star, the Sun, is so hot that the huge amount of hydrogen is undergoing a constant star-wide nuclear reaction, like in a hydrogen bomb.
What is the Sun’s composition?
The Sun is a huge ball of hydrogen and helium held together by its own gravity.
Do all stars have the same composition?
My astronomy book mentions that all stars have basically the same composition: 71% Hydrogen, 27% Helium, 2% Other. The star can’t maintain energy output as fusion goes to heavier elements, so eventually the star dies. If it’s big enough, it can go supernova and create even heavier elements past iron.
What atoms are in a star?
Stars are made mostly of hydrogen and helium, which are packed so densely in a star that in the star’s center the pressure is great enough to initiate nuclear fusion reactions. In a nuclear fusion reaction, the nuclei of two atoms combine to create a new atom.
What is element’s compose a star?
Stars are made of very hot gas. This gas is mostly hydrogen and helium, which are the two lightest elements. Stars shine by burning hydrogen into helium in their cores, and later in their lives create heavier elements. Most stars have small amounts of heavier elements like carbon, nitrogen, oxygen and iron,…
What is the composition of interstellar gas?
Interstellar gas is composed of either molecules or atoms of gasses with hydrogen and helium being the most abundant. Carbon monoxide, oxygen and nitrogen are other forms of interstellar gas, but in much, much smaller quantities. Dust is composed of little bits of solid matter.
What spectral class is the Sun?
The Sun is a G-type main-sequence star (G2V) based on its spectral class. As such, it is informally and not completely accurately referred to as a yellow dwarf (its light is closer to white than yellow).