astronomy

William F. Bottke

William F. Bottke is a astronomy topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand William F. Bottke rather than just read about it. In short: William F. "Bill" Bottke (born 1966) is a planetary scientist specializing in asteroids. He works at the Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colorado.

Key takeaways

William F. Bottke belongs to astronomy; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect William F. Bottke to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of William F. Bottke from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

William F. "Bill" Bottke (born 1966) is a planetary scientist specializing in asteroids. He works at the Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colorado.

Education Bottke received his undergraduate degrees, in physics and astrophysics, at the University of Minnesota in 1988. In 1995, he received his PhD in planetary science from the University of Arizona for research on asteroid dynamics.

Research interests Bottke's research focuses on modeling various properties in asteroid dynamics. He has published extensively on the importance of tidal disruption and the Yarkovsky and YORP effects on the physical structure and orbits of asteroids, and the early solar system, particularly the Late Heavy Bombardment.

Cretaceous–Paleogene (Cretaceous–Tertiary) impactor In 2007, Bottke published a paper in Nature (with David Vokrouhlický and David Nesvorný), proposing that the asteroid that produced the Chicxulub Crater and caused the Cretaceous mass extinction (although the latter is still contended) formed during an asteroid breakup in the main asteroid belt approximately 160 million years ago. Bottke and his collaborators base this on a model for the evolution of the Baptistina asteroid family, in which fragments from the collision that formed the family migrate throughout the inner solar system. They date the event based on the current orbits of Baptistina family members, and then compute the orbital evolution of smaller (few-km) objects produced in the collision, and conclude that the Chicxulub impact or was one such object. They also propose that Tycho crater on the Moon was created by an object produced in the same collision. However, subsequent evidence has disproven this theory. A 2009 spectrographic analysis revealed that 298 Baptistina has a different composition more typical of an S-type asteroid than the presumed carbonaceous chondrite composition of the Chicxulub impactor.

References

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with William F. Bottke

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what William F. Bottke claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In astronomy, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to William F. Bottke before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about William F. Bottke ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of William F. Bottke

In research: William F. Bottke appears in astronomy research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses William F. Bottke in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: William F. Bottke is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1966 births, Living people, Planetary scientists, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for William F. Bottke outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study William F. Bottke in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what William F. Bottke means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain William F. Bottke out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is William F. Bottke in simple terms?

William F. "Bill" Bottke (born 1966) is a planetary scientist specializing in asteroids. He works at the Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colorado.

Why does William F. Bottke matter?

Because it connects several astronomy ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study William F. Bottke?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on William F. Bottke.