Heberto Rodriguez

Physics 1010

Professor: David Schaffer

Reflective writing

Semester project

This signature assignment had me going all over the place to find information about the

questions that were presented to us in our project. I wasnt sure how to showcase my project, but I

finally decided to go with a PowerPoint presentation. You will find in my presentation that my project is

divided into four parts.

The first part is the identification of four stars in the Lyra Constellation. The second part is a

learning analysis about the famous formula E = mc2 with attempts to answer a few questions regarding

each variable in the equation using opinionated guesses and scientific facts. The third part learning

about the Law of Physics I tackled the universal law of gravity and shared a few things about that law. A

last part four is regarding the rare earth hypothesis. Is there life in other neighboring solar systems or

galaxies? And what conditions are needed to support such life.

Studying the Lyra constellation was very intriguing. I kept looking outside at night to see if I can

spot the constellation and pinpoint the stars that I show cased on my project. The first star that I chose

was Vega also known as Alpha Lyrae. Being only 25 light years from earth it is the fifth brightest star is

our sky it has a radius of 1.961 million km and 40 times more luminous than our sun. It is surrounded by

a large disc of dust which suggest that planet forming activity is or has taken place. The second is the

Sulafat known as Gamma Lyrae. This star is 12.77 million km radius and is 2100 times more luminous
than our sun. being the second brightest star in the sky and the name deriving from a Arabic al-sulaft,

which means The Turtle. Third on the list is Sheliak known as Beta Lyrae. Sheliak is a double star

system that is 962.13 light years from earth and has a radius of a whopping 19.98 million km. To the

naked eye Sheliak looks like a single star but this monstrosity has two stars dancing around each other.

Sheliak is the faintest star in the constellation. Last but not least is Epsilon and no not Epsilon the dog

from the movie UP. This Epsilon is known as double double the reason behind it, it also has two stars

near each other. They are about 162.35 light years away from earth with a radius of 2.86 million km. The

star is distinguishable with a telescope. With so many double star systems in the sky Epsilon becomes

one of the easiest to see so easy to distinguish them that you can you a pair of binoculars and see both

of them, which makes it very special.

The second part of my semester project was learning and figuring out some things pertaining to

the equation E=mc2. Before taking this class, I knew that it was Albert Einsteins formula that will lead

the way for scientist to figure out the atomic bomb. But what does that formula actually mean? Well

lets put it this way E=mc2 = Atomic Bomb. Yup, the formula is about the amount of energy that mass

can produce. Einsteins Specialty

Part three the universal law of Gravity stating that everything pulls on each other and the

greater the mass of the object the greater the gravitational pull and the close objects are to each other

the greater attraction is between them. Which is why we dont go flying off into space, well one of the

reasons why. A series of real life examples of how gravity relates to us in our life. The examples were the

moon and earth in their celestial dance. As both bodies pull on each other just enough to keep a perfect

orbital rotation. Even when jumping out of an airplane, I could feel my body being pulled down to earth.

It was a fantastic feeling. It was different than the feeling that you get from a roller coaster right it felt

more like a magnetic attraction. I finally talk about the International Space Station. One thing that I

learned about in the class about gravity is that there is no such thing as no gravity or anti-gravity. The
reason why things tend to float we can say is because when an object is in a state of free fall it

experiences weightlessness because the support floor reads zero. So the ISS is in a state of free fall

forever falling around the earth because it has enough gravitational pull from earth so it doesnt go

shooting off into space but not enough strength to completely pull it down (unless we get closer to

earth).

The Rare Earth hypothesis was an interesting topic to look up and find. Not much did I find

about it. However, there were some key things that needed to be shared. One big things was that the

hypothesis claims that for there to be any kind of earth planet they need to be kept within a certain

zone to sustain complex life form. Another idea was that plate tectonics plays a crucial role in creating

an environment habitable for species to grow and sexually reproduce and to abide in a livable

ecosystem. Now the third idea was that the earth is typical and theres nothing special about it. That

countless of stars have their own solar systems of planets which may house an earth like just like ours.

Now there are those who oppose this type of thinking. Fermi paradox named after Enrico Fermi

prompted the question Where is everybody?. Which states the fact that aliens dont seem to be

walking our planet implies that there are no extraterrestrials in the vastness of space. If they are so

common, why arent they obvious and how can they be obvious if it doesnt exist.

Yet in December 5th 2011 a team of scientist found with the help of the Kepler telescope an

earth like planet orbiting its own sun and in the right place to sustain life. This was a huge discovery and

to me it was fascinating news. Which supports the idea that we might not be alone in the universe.

The most challenging part of the signature assignment was finding out if E=mc2 could ever be

negative. I have never dived into the formula until now. It was a challenge to figure out in a short time

what took physicist years to discover.

 In some ways the signature assignment helped with what I learned. Some things that were used

was the laws of physics, but there were things like finding out the stars and then looking at the rare

earth hypothesis were a bit off course than what we have been learning in class. I learned a lot though

from researching it that it peaked my interest in astronomy now.

The process that I went through was doing a lot of research and reading a lot about the

material. For one I feel that I have grown in my knowledge of physics. I am very interested in the Law of

Universal Gravity I enjoyed learning about that section of our text book. This class helped me

understand the why and how things work in our world.