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LL Pegasi
LL Pegasi (AFGL 3068) is a Mira variable star surrounded by a pinwheel-shaped nebula, IRAS 23166+1655, thought to be a Protoplanetary nebula, preplanetary nebula. It is a binary system (astronomy), binary system that includes an extreme carbon star. The pair is hidden by the dust cloud ejected from the carbon star and is only visible in infrared light. Variability LL Pegasi is obscured at visual wavelengths, but is strongly variable in brightness at infrared wavelengths. It is classified as a Mira variable and has a period of about 696 days. Nebula The nebula displays an unusual Archimedean spiral shape. The shape is thought to be formed through the interaction between the stellar companion and the carbon star, as has been seen in other binary star, binary systems, although not with such a precise geometric form. The distance between the spiral arms and their rate of expansion is consistent with estimates of the pair's 810 year orbital period based on their apparent ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Celestial Spiral With A Twist
Celestial may refer to: Science * Objects or events seen in the sky and the following astronomical terms: ** Astronomical object, a naturally occurring physical entity, association, or structure that exists in the observable universe ** Celestia, a 3D astronomy program that allows users to travel through the universe, also known as a celestial body or object ** Celestial coordinate system, a system for mapping positions on the celestial sphere ** Celestial mechanics, the branch of astronomy that deals with the motions of celestial objects ** Celestial navigation, a position-fixing technique that helps sailors cross the oceans ** Celestial pole, the two points in the sky, north and south, where the projection of a planet's axis of rotation intersects its celestial sphere ** Celestial sphere, an imaginary sphere concentric with the Earthall objects in the sky can be thought of as projected upon the celestial sphere ** Celestial spheres, fundamental entities of the cosmological mo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Binary Star
A binary star is a system of two stars that are gravitationally bound to and in orbit around each other. Binary stars in the night sky that are seen as a single object to the naked eye are often resolved using a telescope as separate stars, in which case they are called ''visual binaries''. Many visual binaries have long orbital periods of several centuries or millennia and therefore have orbits which are uncertain or poorly known. They may also be detected by indirect techniques, such as spectroscopy (''spectroscopic binaries'') or astrometry (''astrometric binaries''). If a binary star happens to orbit in a plane along our line of sight, its components will eclipse and transit each other; these pairs are called ''eclipsing binaries'', or, together with other binaries that change brightness as they orbit, ''photometric binaries''. If components in binary star systems are close enough they can gravitationally distort their mutual outer stellar atmospheres. In some cases, thes ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mira Variables
Mira variables (named for the prototype star Mira) are a class of pulsating stars characterized by very red colours, pulsation periods longer than 100 days, and amplitudes greater than one magnitude in infrared and 2.5 magnitude at visual wavelengths. They are red giants in the very late stages of stellar evolution, on the asymptotic giant branch (AGB), that will expel their outer envelopes as planetary nebulae and become white dwarfs within a few million years. Mira variables are stars massive enough that they have undergone helium fusion in their cores but are less than two solar masses, stars that have already lost about half their initial mass. However, they can be thousands of times more luminous than the Sun due to their very large distended envelopes. They are pulsating due to the entire star expanding and contracting. This produces a change in temperature along with radius, both of which factors cause the variation in luminosity. The pulsation depends on the mass ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Carbon Stars
A carbon star (C-type star) is typically an asymptotic giant branch star, a luminous red giant, whose atmosphere contains more carbon than oxygen. The two elements combine in the upper layers of the star, forming carbon monoxide, which consumes most of the oxygen in the atmosphere, leaving carbon atoms free to form other carbon compounds, giving the star a "sooty" atmosphere and a strikingly ruby red appearance. There are also some dwarf and supergiant carbon stars, with the more common giant stars sometimes being called classical carbon stars to distinguish them. In most stars (such as the Sun), the atmosphere is richer in oxygen than carbon. Ordinary stars not exhibiting the characteristics of carbon stars but cool enough to form carbon monoxide are therefore called oxygen-rich stars. Carbon stars have quite distinctive spectral characteristics, and they were first recognized by their spectra by Angelo Secchi in the 1860s, a pioneering time in astronomical spectroscopy. Spectra ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Objects With Variable Star Designations
Object may refer to: General meanings * Object (philosophy), a thing, being, or concept ** Object (abstract), an object which does not exist at any particular time or place ** Physical object, an identifiable collection of matter * Goal, an aim, target, or objective * Object (grammar), a sentence element, such as a direct object or an indirect object Science, technology, and mathematics Computing * 3D model, a representation of a physical object * Object (computer science), a language mechanism for binding data with methods that operate on that data ** Object-orientation, in which concepts are represented as objects *** Object-oriented programming (OOP), in which an object is an instance of a class or array ** Object (IBM i), the fundamental unit of data storage in the IBM i operating system * Object (image processing), a portion of an image interpreted as a unit * Object file, the output of a compiler or other translator program (also known as "object code") * Object, an in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
IRAS Catalogue Objects
The Infrared Astronomical Satellite (Dutch: ''Infrarood Astronomische Satelliet'') (IRAS) was the first space telescope to perform a survey of the entire night sky at infrared wavelengths. Launched on 25 January 1983, its mission lasted ten months. The telescope was a joint project of the United States (NASA), the Netherlands ( NIVR), and the United Kingdom ( SERC). Over 250,000 infrared sources were observed at 12, 25, 60, and 100 micrometer wavelengths. Support for the processing and analysis of data from IRAS was contributed from the Infrared Processing and Analysis Center at the California Institute of Technology. Currently, the Infrared Science Archive at IPAC holds the IRAS archive. The success of IRAS led to interest in the 1985 Infrared Telescope (IRT) mission on the Space Shuttle, and the planned Shuttle Infrared Telescope Facility which eventually transformed into the Space Infrared Telescope Facility, SIRTF, which in turn was developed into the Spitzer Space Tel ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
List Of Largest Known Stars
Below are lists of the largest stars currently known, ordered by radius and separated into categories by galaxy. The unit of measurement used is the radius of the Sun (approximately ). The angular diameters of stars can be measured directly using stellar interferometry. Other methods can use lunar occultations or from eclipsing binaries, which can be used to test indirect methods of finding stellar radii. Only a few useful supergiant stars can be occulted by the Moon, including Antares A (Alpha Scorpii A). Examples of eclipsing binaries are Epsilon Aurigae (Almaaz), VV Cephei, and V766 Centauri (HR 5171). Angular diameter measurements can be inconsistent because the boundary of the very tenuous atmosphere ( opacity) differs depending on the wavelength of light in which the star is observed. Uncertainties remain with the membership and order of the lists, especially when deriving various parameters used in calculations, such as stellar luminosity and effective temperature. O ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Keck II
The W. M. Keck Observatory is an astronomical observatory with two telescopes at an elevation of 4,145 meters (13,600 ft) near the summit of Mauna Kea in the U.S. state of Hawaii. Both telescopes have aperture primary mirrors, and when completed in 1993 (Keck 1) and 1996 (Keck 2) were the largest astronomical telescopes in the world. They are currently the 3rd and 4th largest. Overview With a concept first proposed in 1977, telescope designers at the University of California, Berkeley (Terry Mast) and Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory (Jerry Nelson) had been developing the technology necessary to build a large, ground-based telescope. With a design in hand, a search for the funding began. In 1985, Howard B. Keck of the W. M. Keck Foundation gave $70 million to fund the construction of the Keck I telescope, which began in September 1985, with first light occurring on 24 November 1990 using nine of the eventual 36 segments. With construction of the first telescope well adv ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Adaptive Optics
Adaptive optics (AO) is a technology used to improve the performance of optical systems by reducing the effect of incoming wavefront distortions by deforming a mirror in order to compensate for the distortion. It is used in astronomical telescopes and laser communication systems to remove the effects of atmospheric distortion, in microscopy, optical fabrication and in retinal imaging systems to reduce optical aberrations. Adaptive optics works by measuring the distortions in a wavefront and compensating for them with a device that corrects those errors such as a deformable mirror or a liquid crystal array. Adaptive optics should not be confused with active optics, which works on a longer timescale to correct the primary mirror geometry. Other methods can achieve resolving power exceeding the limit imposed by atmospheric distortion, such as speckle imaging, aperture synthesis, and lucky imaging, or by moving outside the atmosphere with space telescopes, such as the Hubble Sp ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Guide Star
In astronomy, a guide star is a reference star used to accurately maintain the tracking by a telescope of a celestial body, whose apparent motion through the sky is primarily due to Earth's rotation. Accurate telescope pointing and tracking is critical for obtaining good astronomical images and astrophotographs. However, because Earth rotates, the sky appears to be in a constant state of motion relative to Earth. Although this movement appears to be relatively slow when viewed with the naked eye, with the high magnification and consequently smaller field of view provided by even a small telescope, this motion becomes apparent on timescales of the order of seconds. Though space telescopes are not mounted on a spinning planet, they still use guide stars including those listed in the HST Guide Star Catalog. Computer-controlled electric motors are commonly employed to allow the telescope to move in sync with the apparent motion of the sky, according to a pre-computed pointing mo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hubble Space Telescope
The Hubble Space Telescope (often referred to as HST or Hubble) is a space telescope that was launched into low Earth orbit in 1990 and remains in operation. It was not the first space telescope, but it is one of the largest and most versatile, renowned both as a vital research tool and as a public relations boon for astronomy. The Hubble telescope is named after astronomer Edwin Hubble and is one of NASA's Great Observatories. The Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) selects Hubble's targets and processes the resulting data, while the Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) controls the spacecraft. Hubble features a mirror, and its five main instruments observe in the ultraviolet, visible, and near-infrared regions of the electromagnetic spectrum. Hubble's orbit outside the distortion of Earth's atmosphere allows it to capture extremely high-resolution images with substantially lower background light than ground-based telescopes. It has recorded some of the most detaile ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
