What does the mass of a star determine?

Answer 1

Good question. Mass is one of those things that is basic and is determined by comparison to a reference kilogram standard. The maintenance of this standard is incredibly difficult, and recently attempts have been made to update the standard to a countable number of silicon atoms or a comparison to a known force.

Answer 2

For main sequence stars.

The mass of a star will determines how quickly it burns its hydrogen fuel.

How fast it burns it fuel determines how hot it gets.

How hot a star is determines its spectral colour.

Obtaining the spectrum of a star through clever optical telescopes can tell us the stars peak output colour and therefore its temperature, therefore the star's mass by backwards interpolation.

Answer 3

For most you can't ...

but some stars are binary - two stars close together, that rotate around each other.

From the spacing and the velocity their masses can be calculated.

After a large number of these, they found a correlation with spectral type.

Answer 4

The most reliable way to measure that is by observing the effect on other objects. For example, if two stars orbit one another - a rather common situation - and the distance to the pair is known, then there is a relationship between the distance between the stars, the rotational period, and the masses.

Answer 5

The mass of a star determines its size, temperature, brightness, and ultimately its life cycle. More massive stars burn through their fuel faster and end their lives in explosive events like supernovae, while less massive stars may have longer lifetimes and end as white dwarfs.

Answer 6

The mass of any object can be determined by multiplying the volume of the object by the density of the object

Answer 7

How long a star lives depends on its mass.

Answer 8

a star's position can be determined by using a telescope but you have to coordinate all the exact points like maybe a star is 93,000 km away from mars, and 650,000 km away from earth.

Answer 9

"Directly" only if they have companion stars (close binaries). All others by assumption that equal masses have equal characteristics.