what causes different stars to appear?

Answer 1

Stars appear different from one another for several reasons. First, because not all stars are the same distance from earth some are brighter, some are dimmer. Second, the actual brightness of a star depends mainly on its mass and age, so a very bright, distant star can appear the same brightness as a dim, nearby one. More massive stars that are young tend to be very bright, and give off blue-white light. Less massive stars are white, then pale yellow, orange, then red. However, each star goes through a cycle during it's lifetime, so color alone cannot be used to determine mass. Middle aged stars are said to be in the "Main Sequence" of a diagram with color (actually, spectral type) for one axis and temperature for the other axis. The spectral type is determined by the elements that occur in the star as revealed by it's spectrum.

Answer 2

Assuming you're asking why we see different stars in the night sky, there are two answers. The Earth rotates on its axis, so stars rise and set just like the sun and moon. The other reason is that the Earth orbits the sun - at any given time of year there'll be many stars that are invisible because they're only above the horizon during the day. Six months later, the Earth's on the opposite side of the sun and those daytime stars are now visible at night.

Answer 3

The Question
(Submitted April 22, 1997)

Are all stars formed from nebulae? If not where do they come from? What happens to a star after they are burned out? Do all stars end up a black hole or supernova? What determines their final destination? Where will our Sun end up when its fuel is spent? What are dwarf stars?


The Answer
Yes, all stars are formed from nebulae (the plural of nebula). Nebula is a term for a cloud of gas, and stars form from gas. Stars more massive than ~ 6 solar masses are expected to supernova, stars less massive than this (like our Sun, of course) become white dwarfs. After a supernova, there may be nothing left, or there could be a remnant: either a neutron star or a blackhole. If the remnant is more massive than around 3 solar masses it will probably end up as a blackhole. Stars are smallest when they are burning hydrogen into helium, which is what stars do during most of their lifetimes. Stars in this stage are sometimes called dwarfs. There are also two other kinds of "dwarfs": white dwarfs are burned-out stars mentioned above (the Learning Center has more info on these), and brown dwarfs are stars which never accumulated enough mass to start burning hydrogen.
Andy Ptak
for the Ask an Astrophysicist Team

Answer 4

Light from the city. Atmospheric conditions.

Different you mean from night to night or different from each other?

All stars are different and therefore appear different?

What they are made out of as well as their Distance will all
affect the star appearance.

There is a lot of research going on about how the stars visuality is being affected by city lights.

It's getting harder to find that big dipper!

Answer 5

They appear in our visible sky depending on the seasons, because of the Earth axis inclination. The stars visible from the south hemisphere are different from those visible from the north hemisphere.
I am not sure if that is what you were asking.

Answer 6

Stars flicker via fact of atmospheric outcomes, as different solutions have stated. they variety in coloration, via fact the easy from the celebs IS in diverse colorations, gazing the temperature on the floor of the megastar. the main well liked stars are bluish, then white, yellow and finally pink, via fact the coolest stars ('pink giants'). the colorations are plenty greater obvious whilst looking through a telescope; or possibly a pair of binoculars. The redder stars (jointly with antares interior the constellation scorpio) are regularly pink giants, swollen and going contained in direction of the final tiers of their evolution. Our sunlight will swell up as a pink huge; increasing previous the orbit of venus in approximately 4 billion years.

Answer 7

Darkness.

Answer 8

A clear sky.