Home Table of Contents About the Authors Glossary Buy This Book Joseph Henry Press


EXERCISE 17

see solution

energy: TOC for Knowledge Concepts, Exercises, and Solutions


Suppose that spectroscopy of a particular
atmospheric feature on Jupiter reveals the following information:

    -- High-density, low-energy methane and ammonia gas exist there.
       There is much more methane than ammonia.
    -- So does low-density, high-energy water vapor and carbon dioxide.
       There is much more water vapor than carbon dioxide.
    -- The temperature of the feature is 200 degrees K.

Furthermore, you know that the molecules mentioned above have the
following atomic transitions:

    methane at 12500 and 16000 nm
    ammonia at 14000 and 21000 nm
    water vapor at 15000 and 28000 nm
    carbon dioxide at 17000 nm, 18500 nm, and 24500 nm

Sketch the spectrum of this atmospheric feature between 10000 and 30000 nm.
Put wavelength on the horizontal axis and luminosity on the vertical axis.
The vertical axis need not be to scale, but be as accurate as possible for
the positions of emission, absorption, and continuum features
on the horizontal axis.  Do this problem on graph paper, or label your
feature positions very carefully.