Question

Your enemys star cruiser just blew up. As the fireball cooled it changed color from blue white to yellow red. Assuming it acted like a blackbody, as the fireball cooled the peak wavelength of its radiation

Answer 1

As the temperature of a blackbody decreases, Wien's Law dictates that its peak wavelength of radiation shifts to longer wavelengths. This is exemplified by the cosmic background radiation that has cooled over billions of years and now peaks in the microwave spectrum.

Step-by-step explanation:

As a blackbody cools down, the peak wavelength of its radiation shifts to longer wavelengths according to Wien's Law. In the context of the cosmic background radiation described, the remnants of the primordial fireball have now cooled due to the expansion of the universe. The detection of this radiation from the primordial fireball was initially made by Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson, which confirmed the predictions of George Gamow and his collaborators. They discovered that the universe's expansion stretched the wavelengths, and the cosmic background radiation that we observe today peaks in the microwave part of the spectrum, and corresponds to a blackbody radiation temperature of about 2.7 K.

When the question mentions a star cruiser changing color from blue-white to yellow-red as it cools, it is an example of Wien's Law in action. As the temperature decreases, the peak wavelength of the emitted radiation moves to longer, red wavelengths, which correlates to the color change observed.