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Damped Lyman-alpha System
Damped Lyman alpha systems or Damped Lyman alpha absorption systems is a term used by astronomers for concentrations of neutral hydrogen gas that are detected in the spectra of quasars – a class of distant Active Galactic Nuclei. They are defined to be systems where the column density (density projected along the line of sight to the quasar) of hydrogen is larger than 2 x 1020 atoms/cm2. The observed spectra consist of neutral hydrogen Lyman alpha absorption lines which are broadened by radiation damping. These systems can be observed in quantity at relatively high redshifts of 2–4, when they contained most of the neutral hydrogen in the universe. They are believed to be associated with the early stages of galaxy formation, as the high neutral hydrogen column densities of DLAs are also typical of sightlines in the Milky Way, and other nearby galaxies. Since they are observed in absorption rather than emissions by their stars, they offer the opportunity to study the dynamics ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Astronomer
An astronomer is a scientist in the field of astronomy who focuses their studies on a specific question or field outside the scope of Earth. They observe astronomical objects such as stars, planets, natural satellite, moons, comets and galaxy, galaxies – in either observational astronomy, observational (by analyzing the data) or theoretical astronomy. Examples of topics or fields astronomers study include planetary science, Sun, solar astronomy, the Star formation, origin or stellar evolution, evolution of stars, or the galaxy formation and evolution, formation of galaxies. A related but distinct subject is physical cosmology, which studies the Universe as a whole. Types Astronomers usually fall under either of two main types: observational astronomy, observational and theoretical astronomy, theoretical. Observational astronomers make direct observations of Astronomical object, celestial objects and analyze the data. In contrast, theoretical astronomers create and investigate C ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Galaxy Formation And Evolution
The study of galaxy formation and evolution is concerned with the processes that formed a heterogeneous universe from a homogeneous beginning, the formation of the first galaxies, the way galaxies change over time, and the processes that have generated the variety of structures observed in nearby galaxies. Galaxy formation is hypothesized to occur from structure formation theories, as a result of tiny quantum fluctuations in the aftermath of the Big Bang. The simplest model in general agreement with observed phenomena is the Lambda-CDM model—that is, that clustering and merging allows galaxies to accumulate mass, determining both their shape and structure. Commonly observed properties of galaxies Because of the inability to conduct experiments in outer space, the only way to “test” theories and models of galaxy evolution is to compare them with observations. Explanations for how galaxies formed and evolved must be able to predict the observed properties and types of galax ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Physical Cosmology
Physical cosmology is a branch of cosmology concerned with the study of cosmological models. A cosmological model, or simply cosmology, provides a description of the largest-scale structures and dynamics of the universe and allows study of fundamental questions about its Cosmogony, origin, structure, Chronology of the universe, evolution, and ultimate fate.For an overview, see Cosmology as a science originated with the Copernican principle, which implies that astronomical object, celestial bodies obey identical physical laws to those on Earth, and Newtonian mechanics, which first allowed those physical laws to be understood. Physical cosmology, as it is now understood, began with the development in 1915 of Albert Einstein's general relativity, general theory of relativity, followed by major observational discoveries in the 1920s: first, Edwin Hubble discovered that the universe contains a huge number of external Galaxy, galaxies beyond the Milky Way; then, work by Vesto Sli ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lyman-break Galaxy
Lyman-break galaxies are star-forming galaxies at high redshift that are selected using the differing appearance of the galaxy in several imaging filters due to the position of the Lyman limit. The technique has primarily been used to select galaxies at redshifts of ''z'' = 3–4 using ultraviolet and optical filters, but progress in ultraviolet astronomy and in infrared astronomy has allowed the use of this technique at lower and higher redshifts using ultraviolet and near-infrared filters. The Lyman-break galaxy selection technique relies on the fact that radiation at higher energies than the Lyman limit at 912 Å is almost completely absorbed by neutral gas around star-forming regions of galaxies. In the rest frame of the emitting galaxy, the emitted spectrum is bright at wavelengths longer than 912 Å, but very dim or imperceptible at shorter wavelengths—this is known as a " dropout", or "break", and can be used to find the position of the Lyman limit. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lyman-alpha Forest
The Lyman-alpha line, typically denoted by Ly-α, is a spectral line of hydrogen (or, more generally, of any one-electron atom) in the Lyman series. It is emitted when the atomic electron transitions from an ''n'' = 2 orbital to the ground state (''n'' = 1), where ''n'' is the principal quantum number. In hydrogen, its wavelength of 1215.67 angstroms ( or ), corresponding to a frequency of about , places Lyman-alpha in the ultraviolet (UV) part of the electromagnetic spectrum. More specifically, Ly-α lies in vacuum UV (VUV), characterized by a strong absorption in the air. Fine structure The Lyman-alpha doublet. Because of the spin–orbit interaction, the Lyman-alpha line splits into a fine-structure doublet with the wavelengths of 1215.668 and 1215.674 angstroms. These components are called Ly-α3/2 and Ly-α1/2, respectively. The eigenstates of the perturbed Hamiltonian are labeled by the ''total'' angular momentum ''j'' of the electron, not just the o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lyman-alpha Emitter
A Lyman-alpha emitter (LAE) is a type of distant galaxy that emits Lyman-alpha radiation from neutral hydrogen. Most known LAEs are extremely distant, and because of the finite travel time of light they provide glimpses into the history of the universe. They are thought to be the progenitors of most modern Milky Way type galaxies. These galaxies can be found nowadays rather easily in narrow-band searches by an excess of their narrow-band flux at a wavelength which may be interpreted from their redshift: : 1+z=\frac where z is the redshift, \lambda is the observed wavelength, and 1215.67 Å is the wavelength of Lyman-alpha emission. The Lyman-alpha line in most LAEs is thought to be caused by recombination of interstellar hydrogen that is ionized by an ongoing burst of star-formation. Such Lyman alpha emission was first suggested as a signature of young galaxies by Bruce Partridge and P. J. E. Peebles in 1967. Experimental observations of the redshift of LAEs are important in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lyman-alpha Blob
In astronomy, a Lyman-alpha blob (LAB) is a huge concentration of a gas emitting the Lyman-alpha emission line. LABs are some of the largest known individual objects in the Universe. Some of these gaseous structures are more than 400,000 light years across. So far they have only been found in the high-redshift universe because of the ultraviolet nature of the Lyman-alpha emission line. Since Earth's atmosphere is very effective at filtering out UV photons, the Lyman-alpha photons must be redshifted in order to be transmitted through the atmosphere. The most famous Lyman-alpha blobs were discovered in 2000 by Steidel et al. Matsuda et al., using the Subaru Telescope of the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan extended the search for LABs and found over 30 new LABs in the original field of Steidel et al., although they were all smaller than the originals. These LABs form a structure which is more than 200 million light-years in extent. It is currently unknown whether LABs ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Milky Way
The Milky Way is the galaxy that includes our Solar System, with the name describing the galaxy's appearance from Earth: a hazy band of light seen in the night sky formed from stars that cannot be individually distinguished by the naked eye. The term ''Milky Way'' is a translation of the Latin ', from the Greek ('), meaning "milky circle". From Earth, the Milky Way appears as a band because its disk-shaped structure is viewed from within. Galileo Galilei first resolved the band of light into individual stars with his telescope in 1610. Until the early 1920s, most astronomers thought that the Milky Way contained all the stars in the Universe. Following the 1920 Great Debate between the astronomers Harlow Shapley and Heber Curtis, observations by Edwin Hubble showed that the Milky Way is just one of many galaxies. The Milky Way is a barred spiral galaxy with an estimated D25 isophotal diameter of , but only about 1,000 light years thick at the spiral arms (more at the bulg ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Redshift
In physics, a redshift is an increase in the wavelength, and corresponding decrease in the frequency and photon energy, of electromagnetic radiation (such as light). The opposite change, a decrease in wavelength and simultaneous increase in frequency and energy, is known as a negative redshift, or blueshift. The terms derive from the colours red and blue which form the extremes of the visible light spectrum. In astronomy and cosmology, the three main causes of electromagnetic redshift are # The radiation travels between objects which are moving apart (" relativistic" redshift, an example of the relativistic Doppler effect) #The radiation travels towards an object in a weaker gravitational potential, i.e. towards an object in less strongly curved (flatter) spacetime (gravitational redshift) #The radiation travels through expanding space (cosmological redshift). The observation that all sufficiently distant light sources show redshift corresponding to their distance from Earth ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hydrogen
Hydrogen is the chemical element with the symbol H and atomic number 1. Hydrogen is the lightest element. At standard conditions hydrogen is a gas of diatomic molecules having the formula . It is colorless, odorless, tasteless, non-toxic, and highly combustible. Hydrogen is the most abundant chemical substance in the universe, constituting roughly 75% of all normal matter.However, most of the universe's mass is not in the form of baryons or chemical elements. See dark matter and dark energy. Stars such as the Sun are mainly composed of hydrogen in the plasma state. Most of the hydrogen on Earth exists in molecular forms such as water and organic compounds. For the most common isotope of hydrogen (symbol 1H) each atom has one proton, one electron, and no neutrons. In the early universe, the formation of protons, the nuclei of hydrogen, occurred during the first second after the Big Bang. The emergence of neutral hydrogen atoms throughout the universe occurred about 370,000 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Radiation Damping
Radiation damping in accelerator physics is a way of reducing the beam emittance of a high-velocity charged particle beam by synchrotron radiation. The two main ways of using radiation damping to reduce the emittance of a particle beam are the use of ''undulators'' and ''damping rings'' (often containing undulators), both relying on the same principle of inducing synchrotron radiation to reduce the particles' momentum, then replacing the momentum only in the desired direction of motion. Damping rings As particles are moving in a closed orbit, the lateral acceleration causes them to emit synchrotron radiation, thereby reducing the size of their momentum vectors (relative to the design orbit) without changing their orientation (ignoring quantum effects for the moment). In longitudinal direction, the loss of particle impulse due to radiation is replaced by accelerating sections ( RF cavities) that are installed in the beam path so that an equilibrium is reached at the design energy ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lyman Alpha
The Lyman-alpha line, typically denoted by Ly-α, is a spectral line of hydrogen (or, more generally, of any one-electron atom) in the Lyman series. It is emitted when the atomic electron transitions from an ''n'' = 2 orbital to the ground state (''n'' = 1), where ''n'' is the principal quantum number. In hydrogen, its wavelength of 1215.67 angstroms ( or ), corresponding to a frequency of about , places Lyman-alpha in the ultraviolet (UV) part of the electromagnetic spectrum. More specifically, Ly-α lies in vacuum UV (VUV), characterized by a strong absorption in the air. Fine structure The Lyman-alpha doublet. Because of the spin–orbit interaction, the Lyman-alpha line splits into a fine-structure doublet with the wavelengths of 1215.668 and 1215.674 angstroms. These components are called Ly-α3/2 and Ly-α1/2, respectively. The eigenstates of the perturbed Hamiltonian are labeled by the ''total'' angular momentum ''j'' of the electron, not just the o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
