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

Very different values of pressure and density (or temperature or energy) across a shock wave.

→ jump; → condition.

In a → semiconductor device, a region of transition between semiconducting regions of different electrical properties.

Junction "act of joining," from L. junctionem, noun of action from jungere "to join," cognate with Pers. yuq, juhé, as below; PIE base *yeug- "to join,"

Juheš, from juh, variant of yuq "yoke," Mid.Pers. jug, ayoxtan "to join, yoke;" Av. yaog- "to yoke, put to; to join, unite;" cf. Skt. yugam "yoke;" Hittite yugan "yoke;" Gk. zygon "yoke," zeugnyanai "to join, unite;" L. jungere "to join," as above; O.C.S. igo, O.Welsh iou, Lith. jungas O.E. geoc.

An interplanetary mission currently in development by the → European Space Agency planned for launch in 2020. It is aimed mainly at in-depth studies of three potentially ocean-bearing satellites, → Ganymede, → Europa, and → Callisto. JUICE will complete a unique tour of the Jupiter system including several flybys of each planet-sized world, culminating with orbit insertion around Ganymede, the largest moon in the Solar System, followed by nine months of operations in its orbit. JUICE will carry the most powerful scientific payload ever flown to the outer Solar System. It consists of 10 state-of-the-art instruments plus one experiment that uses the spacecraft telecommunication system with ground-based instruments.

→ Jupiter; → icy; → explorer; → moon.

1) The right, power, or authority to administer justice by hearing and determining controversies.
2) The extent or range of judicial, law enforcement, or other authority.
3) The territory over which authority is exercised (Dictionary.com).

M.E., from O.Fr. juridiccion and directly from L. iurisdictionem "administration of justice, jurisdiction," from ius "right, law," → just, + dictio "a saying; extent or range of administrative power."

Dâdbaxšâ, from dâd, → justice, + baxš "division; donor, distributor, divider," from baxšidan "to divide, distribute, grant," → division, + -ân suffix of attribution and nuance

1) A reason, fact, circumstance, or explanation that justifies or defends. What is offered as grounds for believing an assertion.
2) An act of justifying.

Verbal noun of → justify.

Râstâvard, from râst "right, true; just, upright, straight" (Mid.Pers. râst "true, straight, direct;" O.Pers. rāsta- "straight, true," rās- "to be right, straight, true;" Av. rāz- "to direct, put in line, set," razan- "order;" cf. Skt. raj- "to direct, stretch," rjuyant- "walking straight;" Gk. orektos "stretched out;" L. regere "to lead straight, guide, rule," p.p. rectus "right, straight;" Ger. recht; E. right; PIE base *reg- "move in a straight line," hence, "to direct, rule") + âvard past stem of âvardan "to bring; to adduce, bring forward in argument or as evidence" (Mid.Pers. âwurtan, âvaritan; Av. ābar- "to bring; to possess," from prefix ā- + Av./O.Pers. bar- "to bear, carry," bareθre "to bear (infinitive)," bareθri "a female that bears (children), a mother;" Mod.Pers. bordan "to carry;" Skt. bharati "he carries;" Gk. pherein; L. fero "to carry").

The inner part of the → solar corona which extends to about two solar radii. It is due to the → Thomson scattering of light from the → photosphere by the free electrons in the corona. The K corona exhibits a → linearly polarized continuous spectrum. The high speeds of the scattering electrons (on the average 10,000 km s^-1 for a temperature of 2 million K) smear out the → Fraunhofer lines except the → H and K lines.

K from Ger. Kontinuum, → continuum; → corona.

A → color index correction applied to the photometric magnitudes and colors of a distant galaxy to compensate for the "reddening" of the galaxy due to → cosmological redshift. K correction is intended to derive the magnitudes in the → rest frame of the galaxy. Typically it is given as K(z) = az + bz², where a and b depend on galaxy types. Conversely, one may deduce the redshift of a galaxy by its colors and a K-correction model.

The term K correction, probably stems from the K-term used by C. W. Wirtz (1918, Astron. Nachr. 206, 109), where K stands for Konstante, the German word for constant. The K-term was a constant offset in the redshift applied to diffuse nebulae in that epoch (source: A. L. Kinney, 1996, ApJ 467, 38); → correction.

A follow-up mission of the → Kepler satellite funded by → NASA. K2 provides an opportunity to continue Kepler's observations in the field of → exoplanets and expand its role into new astrophysical observations by assigning to Kepler new mission.

K, short for → Kepler spacecraft; 2, for second → mission.

Any of a group of four short-lived → mesons distinguished by a → quantum number called → strangeness. Also called K meson and denoted K. They are positive, negative, or neutral and have a mass of about 495 MeV/c (about 970 times that of an → electron).

Kaon, from ka (for the letter K) + (mes)on, → meson.

The contraction of a volume of gas under its → gravity, accompanied by the → radiation of the lost → potential energy as → heat.

After the Scottish physicist William Thomson, also known as Lord Kelvin (1824-1907) and the German physicist and physician Hermann Ludwig Ferdinand von Helmholtz (1821-1894), who made important contributions to the thermodynamics of gaseous systems; → contraction.

An equation that enables the position of a body in an elliptical orbit to be calculated at any given time from its orbital elements. It relates the → mean anomaly of the body to its → eccentric anomaly.

Keplerian, adj. of → Kepler; → equation.

A line joining a planet to the Sun sweeps out equal areas in equal intervals of time (year 1609).

→ Kepler; → second; → law.

A → rotation curve in which the speed of the orbiting body is inversely proportional to the → square root of its distance from the mass concentrated at the center of the system.

→ Keplerian; → rotation; → curve.

A fast-evolving → supernova-like phenomenon resulting from the → merger of compact, binary objects such as two → neutron stars or a neutron star and a → black hole. A kilonova represents an → electromagnetic counterpart to → gravitational waves. Also called → macronova. A simple model of the phenomenon was put forward by Li and Paczynski (1998, ApJL 507, L59). The kilonova phenomenon can last between days and weeks following the merger. Within the small volume of space where a merger occurs, the combination of a huge amount of energy, and a large number of neutrons, is the instigator for the → r-process. The high density favors this rapid → neutron capture by nuclei, leading to the formation of new → chemical elements with high → atomic numbers and high → atomic weights. Many elements heavier than → iron form in these environments, including many rare elements, most notably → platinum (atomic number 78) and → gold (atomic number 79). The decay of heavy atomic nuclei leads to the radioactive heating and a release of electromagnetic radiation. The heat cannot easily escape as radiation, because of the high opacity of the ejected material. The heat is radiated thermally, heating up the nearby matter, which can be then seen in the → near-infrared. It was long thought that the r-process could also occur during core-collapse supernovae, but the density of neutrons within supernovae appears to be too low. The first indication of a kilonova following a short GRB came from the extensive follow-up of GRB 130603B, which was one of the nearest and brightest short GRBs ever detected, and also the first short GRB with an optical afterglow spectrum. The first kilonova found to be associated with a gravitational waves was detected in the study of → GW170817.

The term kilonova was introduced by Metzger et al. (2010, MNRAS 406, 2650), who argued that the peak luminosities of neutron star merger transients are typically ~ few × 10⁴¹ erg s^-1, or a factor of ~ 10³ larger than the → Eddington luminosity for a solar mass object. They therefore dubbed these events kilonovae; from → kilo-; → nova.

An electron tube for converting direct-current energy into radio frequency energy by alternately speeding up and slowing down the electrons. It is used as a microwave amplifier or oscillator in radar and high-frequency radio work.

From Gk. kluzein, klus- "to wash, break over" + -tron.

The proportionality constant C in Kolmogorov's mathematical analysis of → turbulence which states that the spectral energy E(k) in the range of turbulent scales is E(k) =C ε^2/3 k^-5/3, where k represents the → wave number (inversely proportional to the wavelength or → eddy size), and ε is the average energy dissipation per unit mass in the fluid. Experimental measurements give C close to 1.5.

Andrei Nikolaevich Kolmogorov (1903-1987), a prominent Soviet mathematician, who made major advances in different scientific fields, mainly probability theory, topology, turbulence, classical mechanics, and computational complexity; → constant.

The function δⁱ_k of two variables i and j defined by δⁱ_k = 1 if i = j, and δⁱ_k = 0 if i ≠ j.

Leopold Kronecker (1823-1891), a German mathematician; delta, Gk. letter of alphabet.

A colorless, odorless, highly un-reactive gaseous chemical element and a member of the inert gas family. Symbol Kr; atomic number 36; atomic weight 83.80; melting point -156.6°C; boiling point -152.3°C.

Krypton, from Gk. kryptos "concealed, hidden". It was discovered in liquefied atmospheric air by the Scottish chemist William Ramsay and the English chemist Morris William Travers in 1898.

1) A body of seawater that is almost completely cut off from the ocean by a barrier beach.
2) The body of seawater that is enclosed by an atoll.

Lagoon, from Fr. lagune, from It. laguna "pond, lake," from L. lacuna "pond, hole," from lacus "pond;" → nebula.

Mordâb "lagoon," literally "dead water," from mord, mordé "dead" + âb "water."
The first element from mordan, mir- "to die," marg "death," mard "man;" Mid.Pers. murdan "to die;" O.Pers. marta- "dead," martiya- "man;" Av. mərəta- "died, dead," amərətāt- "immortality;" cf. Skt. mar- "to die," mriyáe "dies;" Gk. emorten "to die," ambrotos "immortal;" L. morior "to die" (Fr. mourir), mors, mortis "death" (Fr. mort), immortalis "immortal;" Lith. mirtis "mortal;" O.C.S. mrutvu "dead;" O.Ir. marb; Welsh marw "died;" O.E. morþ "murder;" PIE base *mor-/*mr- "to die."
The second element âb "water," from Mid.Pers. âb "water;" O. Pers. ap- "water;" Av. ap- "water;" cf. Skt. áp- "water;" Hitt. happa- "water;" PIE āp-, ab- "water, river;" cf. Gk. Apidanos, proper noun, a river in Thessalia; L. amnis "stream, river" (from *abnis); O.Ir. ab "river," O.Prus. ape "stream," Lith. upé "stream;" Latv. upe "brook."

A giant → H II region lying in the direction of → Sagittarius about 5,000 → light-years away. It represents a giant cloud of interstellar matter which is currently undergoing star formation, and has already formed a considerable cluster of young stars (NGC 6530).

→ lagoon; → nebula.