An Etymological Dictionary of Astronomy and Astrophysics
English-French-Persian

A → sunspot that follows the → leader spot. Sunspots tend to appear in groups consisting of one leader and several follower spots. The leader and the follower spots having opposite polarities.

Agent noun of follow, from O.E. folgian, fylgan "to follow, pursue," from W.Gmc. *fulg- (cf. O.Fris. folgia, M.Du. volghen, Ger. folgen "to follow").

Laké, → spot; peyrow "follower," from pey "step; after," related to pâ "foot, step, track," → foot, + row "going; which goes," present stem of raftan "to go, walk, proceed," Mid.Pers. raftan, raw-, Proto-Iranian *rab/f- "to go; to attack."

One of a series of dark spots on → Neptune similar in appearance to Jupiter's → Great Red Spot. It was discovered in 1989 by NASA's Voyager 2 space probe. Also known as GDS-89. The dark, oval spot had initial dimensions of 13,000 × 6,600 km, about the same size as Earth. Although it appears similar to Jupiter's spot, which is an → anticyclonic storm, it is believed that the Great Dark Spot is an atmospheric hole similar to the hole in Earth's → ozone layer ozone layer. Moreover, unlike Jupiter's spot, which has lasted for hundreds of years, the lifetimes of Great Dark Spots appear to be much shorter, forming and disappearing once every few years or so. Based on pictures taken by Voyager and since then with the → Hubble Space Telescope, Neptune appears to spend somewhat more than half its time with a Great Dark Spot. Around the Great Dark Spot, winds were measured blowing up to 2,400 km an hour, the fastest in the solar system.

→ great; → dark; → spot.

An anticyclonic storm on the planet Jupiter akin to a hurricane on Earth, but it is enormous (three Earths would fit within its boundaries) and it has persisted for at least the 400 years that humans have observed it through telescopes.

→ great; → red; → spot.

A compact, highly luminous region in a cataclysmic binary located in the accretion disk where the stream of material hits it.

→ hot; → spot.

In a → sunspot group, the first spot to form in the direction of rotation and the last to disappear. It is the largest, the strongest in magnetic intensity, and the closest to the solar equator among the group sunspots. See also → follower spot.

From M.E. leder(e), O.E. lædan "cause to go with one, lead," from W.Gmc. *laithjan (cf. O.S. lithan, O.N. liða "to go," O.H.G. ga-lidan "to travel," Goth. ga-leiþan "to go"); → spot.

Lakké, → spot; pišrow "leader, forerunner," from piš "in front, forward, before" (Mid.Pers. pêš "before, earlier;" O.Pers. paišiya "before; in the presence of") + row "going," present stem of raftan "to go, elapse, glide by, depart" (Mid.Pers. raftan, raw-, Proto-Iranian *rab/f- "to go; to attack").

An approximation in the treatment of photoionized → H II regions, whereby secondary ionizing photons are absorbed immediately very close to their site of emission. The secondary photons, produced by → radiative recombinations directly to the → ground states, are thus ignored with respect to the ionizing photons emitted by the → exciting star. The OTS approximation requires that the ionized gas be sufficiently dense so that secondary ionizing photons are very likely absorbed within the H II region.

→ on; → spot; → approximation.

Nazdineš, → approximation; dar "in," from Mid.Pers. andar, → intra-.

See → Great Red Spot, on Jupiter.

→ red; → spot.

Same as → Wolf number and → sunspot number.

→ relative; → sunspot; → number.

An average of 13 monthly → sunspot numbers, centered on the month of concern. The 1st and 13th months are given a weight of 0.5.

→ smooth; → sunspot; → number.

The → sodium tail of the Moon as it appears in the sky opposite the Sun. The SMS undergoes changes in shape and brightness. It is brighter when the → new moon occurs at → perigee, when the new moon is north of the → ecliptic, and approximately five hours after the new moon.

→ sodium; → Moon; → spot.

A mark on a surface differing sharply in color from its surroundings. → sunspot; → Great Red Spot.

M.E. spotte "a spot, blot, patch;" M.Du. spotte "spot, speck."

Lak(k), lak(k)é "spot, stain."

A phenomenon similar to a → sunspot but occurring on the surface of a star other than Sun. Due to spatial resolution constraints, starspots so far observed are in general much larger than those on the Sun, up to about 30% of the stellar surface may be covered, corresponding to sizes 100 times greater than those on the Sun.

→ star; → spot.

An area seen as a dark patch on the Sun's surface. Sunspots appear dark because they are cooler (of about 4000 °C) than the surrounding → photosphere (about 6000 °C). They range in size from a few hundred kilometers to several times the Earth's diameter and last from a few hours to a few months. Very small sunspots are called → pores. The number of sunspots varies from maximum to minimum in about 11 years, the → sunspot cycle. Their appearance during a cycle follows the → Sporer law. A typical spot has a central → umbra surrounded by a → penumbra, although either features can exist without the other. Sunspots are associated with strong magnetic fields of 0.2 to 0.4 → tesla. A given sunspot has a single magnetic → polarity. The opposite polarity may be found in other sunspots or in the bright and diffuse → facular region adjacent to the sunspot. The first recorded naked-eye sightings of sunspots were by Chinese astronomers in the first century B.C. Johannes Fabricius (1587-1617) was the first to argue that sunspots are areas on the solar surface.

→ Sun; → spot.

→ solar cycle.

→ sunspot; → cycle.

Periods of time when the → relative sunspot number is low. These periods of time occur approximately every 11 years and represent the minimum in the → sunspot cycle.

→ sunspot; → minimum.

A quantity which gives the number of sunspots at a given time. It is defined by the relationship R = k(10g + f), where R is the sunspot number, k is a constant depending on the observation conditions and the instrument used, g is the number of the groups and f is the number of individual spots that can be counted. Also called the → Wolf number and → relative sunspot number.

→ sunspot; → number.