Lecture 35: The Solar Neighborhood
What stars are near the Sun? Now that we have some idea of what we are\nlooking for - rocky planets in the habitable zones of low-mass\nmain-sequence stars - what are the prospects near the Sun? This lecture\nexamines the hunting ground for planets, the nearby stars that make up\nthe Solar Neighborhood. I will describe our nearest neighbor, the\nProxima Centauri/Alpha Centauri triple system, and then look at the\nproperties of our nearest stellar neighbors. What we will find is that\nG-type stars like the Sun are uncommon, only about 7% of all nearby\nmain-sequence stars. Red dwarfs, on the other hand, are very common,\nabout 75%. To find Sun-like main sequence stars, we will have to extend\nour search to larger distances into our Milky Way galaxy proper.\nRecorded live on 2009 Nov 16 in Room 1005 Smith Laboratory on the\nColumbus campus of The Ohio State University.