Visual Activity: Multiwavelength Views – Flashcards
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Select the visible-light view of the galaxy M82. Based on its appearance, what type of galaxy is it?
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irregular
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Look again at the visible-light view of M82. What is the source of the white and blue light that dominates the image?
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stars
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The infrared image of M82 shows a whitish-blue region running down the center, along with a much larger red region. What is emitting the light that is shown in red and what is emitting the light that is shown in whitish-blue?
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the red emission from warm dust grains;whitish-blue is emission from stars.
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Study all of the individual images and the Multi image that combines all of them. Which of the following statements provides the best interpretation of what we see in the Multi image?
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stars in the central region of this galaxy are exploding as supernovae, generating a galactic wind of hot gas and warm dust grains.
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What can we conclude about this galaxy from the fact that there are so many supernovae occurring?
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This galaxy contains an unusually large number of young stars.
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As you learned in Part E, galaxy M82 has unusually active star formation. Why do astronomers think that this is a "burst" of star formation, rather than thinking that this galaxy always has such a high rate of star formation?
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at its current rate of star formation, the galaxy would use up all its dust in just a few hundred million years
