The Short Astrophysics Test

Don't be too ashamed if you got a low score, it was hard! If you got below 25% try guessing randomly next time.
Those who did well (above 50% is good) can pat themselves on the back, and perhaps consider a PhD in astrophysics!

Answers

1. In which constellation is the Andromeda Galaxy?
   1. Pisces
   2. Ursa Major
   3. Orion
   4. Andromeda
   An easy question to start you off.
2. Which object is the least massive?
   1. NGC 5194 (NGC/IC objects are usually galaxies)
   2. 1992 QB₁ (objects beginning with the year of discovery are asteroids)
   3. HD 209458 (the Henry Draper catalog lists stars)
   4. Cygnus X-1 (the black hole at the centre of our galaxy)
3. Which object is the most massive?
   1. Callisto (moon of Jupiter)
   2. Charon (companion to Pluto)
   3. Ceres (largest asteroid in the Main Belt)
4. What diameter is the visible portion of the Milky Way?
   1. 100 light years
   2. 1,000 light years
   3. 10,000 light years
   4. 100,000 light years
5. What is The Great Wall?
   1. A surface feature on Mars
   2. A surface feature on Titan
   3. A galaxy cluster
   4. A solar prominance
6. How old is a globular cluster?
   1. As old as the Earth (about 5 billion years)
   2. As old as the Sun (about 5.5 billion years)
   3. As old as the Galaxy (about 11 billion years)
   4. As old as the Universe (about 13.7 billion years)
7. What is interesting about the Jovian moons Io, Europa and Ganymede?
   1. They have interlocked orbital periods
   2. Their orbits are highly elliptical
   3. They are all volcanic
8. What distance is used in the definition of absolute magnitude?
   1. 1 light year
   2. 1 astronomical unit
   3. 10 light years
   4. 10 parsecs
9. What is the average length of one complete solar sunspot cycle?
   1. 30 days (this is the solar rotational period)
   2. 11 years (this is the period it takes for the poles to flip once)
   3. 22 years (this is the period it takes for the poles to flip and flip back again)
   4. 33 years
10. What's the value of the Hubble constant, which is used to calculate the rate of expansion of the universe?
    1. ~70 (the Hubble constant lies somewhere between 50 and 100, about 70 is a fair estimate)
    3. 206.44 (this is a number I plucked out of the air)
    4. 3 × 10⁸ (this is the speed of light in a vacuum)
11. What is the correct order of spectral classes for stars?
    1. O B A F G K M
    2. A O B K G F M
    3. B A O F K G M
    4. A B O K F G M
    The mnemonic to recall this is "Oh Be A Fine Guy/Girl, Kiss Me!"
12. What value has the Chandrasekhar limit?
    1. 1400 Megaparsecs
    2. 1.4 solar masses
    3. 14 kilohertz
    4. 140 Ångstroms
    The Chandrasekhar limit is the boundry between the mass required to form a white dwarf, and that required to form a neutron star.
13. What does the following equation represent?
    M = (3π⁵÷32)^½ c³ G^−3/2 ρ^−½
    Where c is the internal speed of sound, and ρ is the density.
    1. Jeans mass for a collapsing gas cloud
    2. Equation of a propogating shock front
    3. Planck curve for black body radiation
    4. Limit beyond which a stellar core will collapse
14. Where are the Aten-family asteroids located?
    1. At Jupiter's Lagrange 4 point (Trojan asteroids)
    2. At Jupiter's Lagrange 5 point (also Trojan asteroids)
    3. Beyond the orbit of Neptune (Kuyper Belt and Oort Cloud objects)
    4. Inside the orbit of Earth
15. Stars on the Hayashi track of the Hertzsprung-Russell diagram are:
    1. Pre-main sequence stars
    2. Evolved main sequence stars
    3. Sub-giant stars with low relative luminosities
    4. Stars with planetary nebulae