Astronomy 4:4

Today, Professor Zumwalt had been busy setting up the classroom for the lesson ahead. Students were beginning to enter, and Adorah smiled at each student as they entered. She rearranged the room so the desks formed a circle and the middle of the room was empty. "Welcome back everyone! I hope everyone has been doing well," she said with a smile to her students. "Today, we are going to be looking at the life of a star." With that, Professor Zumwalt waved her wand, and the room changed around them, giving the illusion of being in space. The center of the room that had been cleared of desks featured the Horsehead Nebula.

"This is just a projection similar to the ceiling of the Great Hall." She moved towards the center where all the students would be able to see her. "Stars are born in giant gas clouds called nebulae. These are millions of times bigger than this projection. Gas clouds are a collection of gas in space. As gravity pulls more, the blobs get smaller and also heat up. Eventually, they will get so hot and dense that nuclear reactions start inside them, and they turn into stars producing magical essence and sending it out into the universe. The heat and light from these newborn stars can make nebulae glow in different colors." Adorah told the students as the projection zoomed in and showed the students what she was describing.
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"So, how long a star lives depends on its mass. The bigger they are, the quicker they die. This might seem odd, but the more mass a star has, then the hotter it gets. The hotter it gets, the quicker it exhausts its fuel supply," Adorah said to her students taking a moment to pause. "Our nearest star, the Sun, will exhaust its supply of hydrogen fuel in around 4 billion years. Then the Sun's core will collapse under its gravity. At the same time, its atmosphere will become unstable and start to expand. This will transform the Sun into a huge red giant star."

"This is not good news for the Earth. Closer planets like Mercury will be completely engulfed by the swelling Sun. Earth will be entirely vaporized, and all life on our planet will end. But there's no reason for alarm, we have a few billion years to plan our escape!" Adorah assured them, as all of these students and herself would be long gone before the Sun started its years of dying. "Over the following billion years, the Sun will gradually die. Now our Sun will turn into a white dwarf, most likely, as it is not large enough to turn into a supernova. When a star a few times larger than the Sun runs out of fuel, its end is far more spectacular. A massive shock wave radiates throughout the whole star, which heats up to around 1 billion°C. Then it explodes as a supernova. This flash is as bright as a whole galaxy and leaves behind a rapidly spinning neutron star."

"That is it for tonight guys!" Adorah concluded the class and departed from the classroom after the students all left. She thought it was a lot of information, but she was sure her students could handle it all.
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For full credit, RP the lesson.​

 

[Elodie Wynshaw]

Elodie was starting to feel worn out, working too hard to try and get her wand to behave. The stress was keeping her awake later and had her up earlier. She was worn out, and it was starting to drag her down. A part of her thought that she didn't need to try this hard, but another louder part was screaming over it, convincing her that she had to do this, had to get it right, that she had to do well if she wanted Byron to be proud of her.

She tried to focus on that, stopping in the girls room and trying to wake herself up enough for one more class. She felt better with a freshly washed face, so hiking her bag on her shoulder again she hurried up the tower.

She was pleased that this lesson was just a lecture- she was getting so tired of the wand work. She scribbled a few notes, happy to listen to what the Professor had to say. She was pleased she managed to stay awake, and focused, until they were dismissed. Ready for bed, Elodie grabbed her things before heading back out again.

 

[Callie Cardoso]

Callie walked into the astronomy classroom and took her usual spot in the room. Her gaze moved towards the professor at the front of the class as the professor got started. She pulled her notes towards her as the professor began going over the life of a star. She made sure she was getting down wall of the important things that the professor was saying. This all felt very sciencey after all the magical essons she'd been getting in all of her other classes. Callied continued to get down what the professor was saying making sure to get everything down. Not wanting to miss too much as it liekly was important. Eventually the lesson was wrapped up and Callie packed up her things and left the room, knowing she'd be dreaming of supernovas.

 

[Enoch Goldewyn]

Enoch walked into the astronomy classroom and took his usual spot in the room. He glanced at the professor at the front of the room as the professor got started. They would be doing the life of a star, and this didn't really help Enoch's current feelings about how small and insignificant things were. He did still take his quill and parchment and did still write things down as the professor was saying them, making sure to get a couple of things that he needed to. Knowing they were likely to come up in the exam. He took notes and looked up at the projection, thinking about the stars and how they were born and died, making sure that he wasn't missing the important things. He gave a little roll of his eyes at what the professor said about the death of their earth, and then headed out of the room the moment he could.

 

[Teddy Pirrip]

Teddy sat in Astronomy class, mesmerised by the projection, so much so that he nearly forgot to take any notes. A quick nudge from his friend snapped him back to reality, and he hurriedly began scribbling down key points. The idea that the sun had another 4 billion years left before it died was weird. It felt like an eternity, and yet, knowing that the sun had a finite lifespan was strange, as did earth and humanity. After finishing his notes, Teddy yawned deeply as the lesson wrapped up, stretching his arms wide as a sign that he was most definitely ready for bed. He gathered his belongings, ready to call it a night, and made his way back to the common room.