Characteristics Of A Star

Stars - massive balls of gas o plasma held together by gravity that give of heat and light.

Characteristics of a Star

1. Brightness - classified into five levels of brightness or apparent magnitude

2. Size - classified into the following groups

• White Dwarfs - less than one tenth the size of the sun
• Neutron Stars - has the mass of a medium sized sun but only 20km in diameter
• Main Sequence Stars - most common star. Sun is an example
• Giant Stars - known to be 10-160 times larger than sun
• Super Giants - largest among all stars. Known to be 375,000 times larger than sun

3. Color - stars vary in color. Red is warm, yellow is hot, blue and white are the hottest.

4. Distance - the stars we see at night are usually giants and super giants. We use the unit light years to determine the distance of a star.

5. Age - most star live up to 10 billion years old. The smaller the star, the longer they live.