Types of stars/suns?

Question

-How many different types of stars are their?

-What are their sizes?

-How many/what different colours can stars/suns be?

Answer 1

I think you will get a lot out of this website.

Answer 2

O, B, A, F, G, K, M, R, N, S

Those are the main classifications of stars. Type "O" is the biggest and brightest, type "S" is the smallest and dimmest. Each of those classifications is further broken down into numerical designations. For example, our sun is a G-2 star.

Sizes? Supergiants are so huge that if you placed one where the sun is now, its surface would touch Mars' orbit. There are even bigger stars. Eta Carinae is one of the biggest stars in our galaxy, and it is undergoing tremendous changes, you can't even see the actual light from it because it is surrounded by all the ejecta it has been throwing off in the last 1,000 years. It is a prime candidate for a supernova. When that happens, you will be able to see it in the daytime.

For information as to the types and variety of suns, Google Hertzsprung-Russel diagram. Hertzsprung and Russell categorized the different types of stars, how long they live, how bright they are, how hot they are, and why. Most stars, like our sun, lie on what is referred to as the "main sequence", where they will burn for millions or billions of years. It is only when they exhaust their nuclear resources that big changes occur, like the red giant or white dwarf phases.

Answer 3

Classification of stars: O, B, A, F, G, K, M.
[Oh Be A Fine Girl(or Guy) Kiss Me.]
The sun is a G2 type star.

Colors?
Blue is the hottest followed by white, then yellow, orangey, and red.

Here is a web site on Star Colors and Temperatures, if you would like to look at it.
http://docs.kde.org/stable/en/kdeedu/kstars/ai-colorandtemp.html

Or you can check-out this web site "The Color of Stars" http://library.thinkquest.org/J002231F/Stars/thecolorofthestars.htm I would have copied-and-pasted it in here, but I chose not to because it is MUCH easier to read off the web site.

Answer 4

There are two main types of stars.
There are the stars that coalesced out of the primordial hydrogen field by the quantum effect.
These are massive stars that eventually explode as super-novas.
There are the stars that were spawned by the ejected rocky material that crashed into the edge of the hydrogen bubble formed by the primary stars when they exploded as super-novas.
Solar systems are the result.
This gave rise to the multitude of different types of stars in solar systems.
The primary stars were all the same except that some varied greatly in size.

Answer 5

A close approximation of a star's temperature can be found by just looking at its color, but can you identify the color of the Sun? Most people would identify the Sun as yellow, but it is in reality a white star. This misrepresentation most likely comes from the Sun being colored yellow in popular media and entertainment. The color of stars range from red/orange being the coolest, yellow in the middle, and white/blue the hottest.
Looking at a star to determine temperature is not a very scientific way to go about things, so scientists turn to something called a spectrum. A spectrum is created when a star's light is passed through a prism and seperated into it's different colors (Mother Nature calls this process a rainbow.). Every chemical element present in a star produces a line in the spectrum and by studying these lines scientists can determine a star's temperature and what the star is made of. Once a star's temperature is precisly determined, it is given a letter identification from one of the following : O B A F G K M with O being the hottest and M the "coolest" (Our Sun is type G). Below is the list of letters corresponding to their temperature range :


Spectral Letter Temperature (F) Temperature (C)
O more than 37,000 more than 20,500
B 17,000 - 37,000 9,430 - 20,500
A 12,500 - 17,000 6,930 - 9,430
F 10,300 - 12,500 5,700 - 6,930
G 8,000 - 10,300 4,400 - 5,700
K 5,500 - 8,000 3,040 - 4,400
M less than 5,500 less than 3,040

Our Sun is type G so it must be between 8,000 and 10,300 degrees F, which is correct. It is actually close to 10,000 which places it near the middle of the spectral classes.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_types


A star is a brilliantly glowing sphere of hot gas whose energy is produced by an internal nuclear fusion process. Stars are contained in galaxies. A galaxy contains not only stars, but clouds of gas and dust. These clouds are called nebulae, and it is in a nebula where stars are born. In the nebula is hydrogen gas which is pulled together by gravity and starts to spin faster. Over millions of years, more hydrogen gas is pulled into the spinning cloud. The collisions which occur between the hydrogen atoms starts to heat the gas in the cloud. Once the temperature reaches 15,000,000 degrees Celsius, nuclear fusion takes place in the center, or core, of the cloud. The tremendous heat given off by the nuclear fusion process causes the gas to glow creating a protostar. This is the first step in the evolution of a star. The glowing protostar continues to accumulate mass. The amount of mass it can accumulate is determined by the amount of matter available in the nebula. Once its mass is stabilized, the star is known as a main sequence star. The new star will continue to glow for millions or even billions of years. As it glows, hydrogen is converted into helium in the core by nuclear fusion. The core starts to become unstable and it starts to contract. The outer shell of the star, which is still mostly hydrogen, starts to expand. As it expands, it cools and starts to glow red. The star has now reached the red giant phase. It is red because it is cooler than the protostar phase and it is a giant because the outer shell has expanded outward. All stars evolve the same way up to the red giant phase. The amount of mass a star has determines which of the following life cycle paths the star will take.

MEDIUM STARS
As a red giant, the hydrogen gas in the outer shell continues to burn as the temperature in the core continues to rise. At 200,000,000 degrees Celsius, the helium atoms fuse to form carbon atoms in the core. The last of the hydrogen gas in the outer shell is blown away to form a ring around the core. This ring is called a planetary nebula. When the last of the helium atoms in the core are fused into carbon atoms, the medium size star begins to die. Gravity causes the last of the star's matter to collapse inward and compact. This is the white dwarf stage which is extremely dense. White dwarfs shine with a white hot light but once all of their energy is gone, they die. The star has now reached the black dwarf phase.



MASSIVE STARS
Once massive stars reach the red giant phase, the core temperature continues to increase as carbon atoms are formed from the fusion of helium atoms. Gravity continues to pull together the carbon atoms in the core until the temperature reaches 600,000,000 degrees Celsius. At this temperature, carbon atoms form heavy elements such as oxygen and nitrogen. The fusion and production of heavy elements continues until iron starts to form. At this point, fusion stops and the iron atoms start to absorb energy. This energy is eventually released in a powerful explosion called a supernova. A supernova can light the sky up for weeks. The temperature in a supernova can reach 1,000,000,000 degrees Celsius. This high temperature can lead to the production of new elements which may appear in the new nebula that results after the supernova explosion. The core of a massive star that is 1.5 to 4 times as massive as our Sun ends up as a neutron star after the supernova. Neutron stars spin rapidly giving off radio waves. If the radio waves appear to be emitted in pulses (due to the star's spin), these neutron stars are called pulsars. The core of a massive star that has 10 or more times the mass of our Sun remains massive after the supernova. No nuclear fusion is taking place to support the core, so it is swallowed by its own gravity. It has now become a black hole which readily swallows any matter and energy that comes too near it. Some black holes have companion stars whose gases they pull off. As the gases are pulled down into the black hole, they heat up and give off energy in the form of X-rays. Black holes are detected by the X-rays which are given off as matter falls down into the hole.