constellation
A constellation is an area on the celestial sphere in which a group of visible stars forms Asterism (astronomy), a perceived pattern or outline, typically representing an animal, mythological subject, or inanimate object.
The origins of the e ...
giraffe
The giraffe is a large African hoofed mammal belonging to the genus ''Giraffa''. It is the tallest living terrestrial animal and the largest ruminant on Earth. Traditionally, giraffes were thought to be one species, ''Giraffa camelopardalis ...
. The constellation was introduced in 1612 or 1613 by
Petrus Plancius
Petrus Plancius (; 1552 – 15 May 1622) was a Dutch-Flemish astronomer, cartographer and clergyman. He was born as Pieter Platevoet in Dranouter, now in Heuvelland, West Flanders. He studied theology in Germany and England. At the age of 24 he ...
. Some older astronomy books give Camelopardalus or Camelopardus as alternative forms of the name, but the version recognized by the
International Astronomical Union
The International Astronomical Union (IAU; french: link=yes, Union astronomique internationale, UAI) is a nongovernmental organisation with the objective of advancing astronomy in all aspects, including promoting astronomical research, outreac ...
matches the genitive form, seen suffixed to most of its key stars.
Etymology
First attested in English in 1785, the word ''camelopardalis'' comes from
Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
, and it is the
romanization
Romanization or romanisation, in linguistics, is the conversion of text from a different writing system to the Roman (Latin) script, or a system for doing so. Methods of romanization include transliteration, for representing written text, and ...
of the Greek "καμηλοπάρδαλις" meaning "giraffe", from "κάμηλος" (''kamēlos''), "
camel
A camel (from: la, camelus and grc-gre, κάμηλος (''kamēlos'') from Hebrew or Phoenician: גָמָל ''gāmāl''.) is an even-toed ungulate in the genus ''Camelus'' that bears distinctive fatty deposits known as "humps" on its back. C ...
" + "πάρδαλις" (''pardalis''), " spotted", because it has a long neck like a camel and spots.
Features
Stars
Although Camelopardalis is the 18th largest constellation, it is not a particularly bright constellation, as the brightest stars are only of fourth magnitude. In fact, it only contains four stars brighter than magnitude 5.0.
* α Cam is a blue-hued supergiant star of magnitude 4.3, over 6,000 light-years from Earth. It is one of the most distant stars easily visible with the naked eye.
* β Cam is the brightest star in Camelopardalis with an
apparent magnitude
Apparent magnitude () is a measure of the brightness of a star or other astronomical object observed from Earth. An object's apparent magnitude depends on its intrinsic luminosity, its distance from Earth, and any extinction of the object's li ...
of 4.03. This star is a
double star
In observational astronomy, a double star or visual double is a pair of stars that appear close to each other as viewed from Earth, especially with the aid of optical telescopes.
This occurs because the pair either forms a binary star (i.e. a bi ...
, with components of magnitudes 4.0 and 8.6. The primary is a yellow-hued supergiant 1000 light-years from Earth.
* 11 Cam is a star of magnitude 5.2, 650 light-years from Earth. It appears without intense magnification very close to magnitude 6.1 12 Cam, at about the same distance from us, but the two are not a true double star; they have considerable separation.
*
Σ 1694
Struve 1694 (Σ 1694, Struve 1694) is a double star in the constellation Camelopardalis.
Σ 1694 is a double star, with components of magnitudes 5.3m and 5.9m:
*Σ 1694A ( HD 112028) is a white A-type giant star with an apparent magnitude o ...
(Struve 1694, 32 Cam) is a
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 wh ...
300 light-years from Earth. Both components have a blue-white hue; the primary is of magnitude 5.4 and the secondary is of magnitude 5.9.
* CS Cam is the second brightest star, though it has neither a
Bayer
Bayer AG (, commonly pronounced ; ) is a German multinational corporation, multinational pharmaceutical and biotechnology company and one of the largest pharmaceutical companies in the world. Headquartered in Leverkusen, Bayer's areas of busi ...
variable
Variable may refer to:
* Variable (computer science), a symbolic name associated with a value and whose associated value may be changed
* Variable (mathematics), a symbol that represents a quantity in a mathematical expression, as used in many ...
.
*
Z Cam Z Cam may refer to:
* Z Camelopardalis, a dwarf nova in the Camelopardalis constellation
* ZCam, a brand of 3D time-of-flight camera products in the 2000s by 3DV Systems
{{disambiguation ...
(varying from amateur telescope visibility to extremely faint) is frequently observed as part of a program of AAVSO. It is the prototype of
Z Camelopardalis variable stars
A U Geminorum-type variable star, or dwarf nova (pl. novae) is one of several types of cataclysmic variable star, consisting of a close binary star system in which one of the components is a white dwarf that accretes matter from its companion. Dwa ...
.
Other variable stars are
U Camelopardalis
U Camelopardalis is a semiregular variable star in the constellation Camelopardalis. Based on parallax measurements made by the Hipparcos spacecraft, it is located about 3,000 light-years (1,000 parsecs) away from the Earth. Its a ...
X Camelopardalis
X, or x, is the twenty-fourth and third-to-last Letter (alphabet), letter in the Latin alphabet, used in the English alphabet, modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its English a ...
RU Camelopardalis
RU Camelopardalis, or RU Cam, is a W Virginis variable (type II Cepheid) in the constellation of Camelopardalis. It is also a Carbon star, which is very unusual for a Cepheid variable.
History
RU Cam was reported as a new variable st ...
is one of the brighter
Type II Cepheid
Type II Cepheids are variable stars which pulsate with periods typically between 1 and 50 days. They are population II stars: old, typically metal-poor, low mass objects.
Like all Cepheid variables, Type IIs exhibit a relationship between the st ...
s visible in the night sky.
In 2011 a supernova was discovered in the constellation.
Deep-sky objects
Camelopardalis is in the part of the celestial sphere facing away from the galactic plane. Accordingly, many distant galaxies are visible within its borders.
* NGC 2403 is a galaxy in the
M81 group
The M81 Group is a galaxy group in the constellations Ursa Major and Camelopardalis that includes the galaxies Messier 81 and Messier 82, as well as several other galaxies with high apparent brightnesses. The approximate center of the group i ...
of galaxies, located approximately 12 million light-years from Earth with a redshift of 0.00043. It is classified as being between an
elliptical
Elliptical may mean:
* having the shape of an ellipse, or more broadly, any oval shape
** in botany, having an elliptic leaf shape
** of aircraft wings, having an elliptical planform
* characterised by ellipsis (the omission of words), or by conc ...
and a
spiral galaxy
Spiral galaxies form a class of galaxy originally described by Edwin Hubble in his 1936 work ''The Realm of the Nebulae''William Herschel, who was working in England at the time. It has an
integrated magnitude
In astronomy, surface brightness (SB) quantifies the apparent brightness or flux density per unit angular area of a spatially extended object such as a galaxy or nebula, or of the night sky background. An object's surface brightness depends on its ...
of 8.0 and is approximately 0.25° long.
*
NGC 1502
NGC 1502 is a young open cluster of approximately 60 stars in the constellation Camelopardalis, discovered by William Herschel on November 3, 1787. It has a visual magnitude of 6.0 and thus is dimly visible to the naked eye. This cluster is loca ...
is a magnitude 6.9
open cluster
An open cluster is a type of star cluster made of up to a few thousand stars that were formed from the same giant molecular cloud and have roughly the same age. More than 1,100 open clusters have been discovered within the Milky Way galaxy, and ...
about 3,000
light year
A light-year, alternatively spelled light year, is a large unit of length used to express astronomical distances and is equivalent to about 9.46 trillion kilometers (), or 5.88 trillion miles ().One trillion here is taken to be 1012 ...
s from Earth. It has about 45 bright members, and features a double star of magnitude 7.0 at its center. NGC 1502 is also associated with
Kemble's Cascade
Kemble's Cascade (designated Kemble 1) is an asterism located in the constellation Camelopardalis. It is an apparent straight line of more than 20 colourful 5th to 10th magnitude stars over a distance of approximately 3 degrees (five moon diameter ...
, a simple but beautiful asterism appearing in the sky as a chain of stars 2.5° long that is parallel to the Milky Way and is pointed towards Cassiopeia. * NGC 1501 is a planetary nebula located roughly 1.4° south of NGC 1502.
* Stock 23 is an open star cluster at the southern part of the border between Camelopardalis and Cassiopeia. It is also known as ''Pazmino's Cluster''. It could be categorized as an ''asterism'' because of the small number of stars in it (a small telescopic ''constellation'').
*
IC 342
IC 342 (also known as Caldwell 5) is an intermediate spiral galaxy in the constellation Camelopardalis, located relatively close to the Milky Way. Despite its size and actual brightness, its location behind dusty areas near the galactic equator m ...
is one of the brightest two galaxies in the
IC 342/Maffei Group
The IC 342/Maffei Group (also known as the IC 342 Group or the Maffei 1 Group) corresponds to one or two galaxy groups close to the Local Group. The member galaxies are mostly concentrated around either IC 342 or Maffei 1, which would be the brig ...
of galaxies.
* The dwarf irregular galaxy NGC 1569 is a magnitude 11.9 starburst galaxy, about 11 million light years away.
* NGC 2655 is a large lenticular galaxy with visual magnitude 10.1.
* UGC 3697 is known as the ''Integral Sign Galaxy'' (its location is 7:11:4 / +71°50').
* MS0735.6+7421 is a galaxy cluster with a
redshift
In physics, a redshift is an increase in the wavelength, and corresponding decrease in the frequency and photon energy, of electromagnetic radiation (such as light). The opposite change, a decrease in wavelength and simultaneous increase in f ...
of 0.216, located 2.6 billion light-years from Earth. It is unique for its intracluster medium, which emits
X-ray
An X-ray, or, much less commonly, X-radiation, is a penetrating form of high-energy electromagnetic radiation. Most X-rays have a wavelength ranging from 10 picometers to 10 nanometers, corresponding to frequencies in the range 30&nb ...
s at a very high rate. This galaxy cluster features two cavities 600,000 light-years in diameter, caused by its central supermassive black hole, which emits jets of matter. MS0735.6+7421 is one of the largest and most distant examples of this phenomenon.
* Tombaugh 5 is a fairly dim open cluster in Camelopardalis. It has an overall magnitude of 8.4 and is located 5,800 light-years from Earth. It is a Shapley class c and Trumpler class III 1 r cluster, meaning that it is irregularly shaped and appears loose. Though it is detached from the star field, it is not concentrated at its center at all. It has more than 100 stars which do not vary widely in brightness, mostly being of the 15th and 16th magnitude.
*
NGC 2146
NGC 2146 is a barred spiral galaxy type SB(s)ab pec in the constellation Camelopardalis. The galaxy was discovered in 1876 by Friedrich August Theodor Winnecke.
It has a diameter of 80,000 lyr. The galaxy's most conspicuous feature is the dust ...
is an 11th magnitude barred spiral starburst galaxy conspicuously warped by interaction with a neighbour.
*
MACS0647-JD
__NOTOC__
MACS0647-JD is a galaxy with a redshift of about ''z'' = 10.7, equivalent to a light travel distance of 13.26 billion light-years (4 billion parsecs). If the distance estimate is correct, it formed about 427 million years after the Big B ...
, one of the possible candidates for the farthest known galaxies in the universe ( z= 10.7), is also in Camelopardalis.
Meteor showers
The annual May meteor shower Camelopardalids from comet 209P/LINEAR have a radiant in Camelopardalis.
Space exploration
The
space probe
A space probe is an artificial satellite that travels through space to collect scientific data. A space probe may orbit Earth; approach the Moon; travel through interplanetary space; flyby, orbit, or land or fly on other planetary bodies; or ent ...
''
Voyager 1
''Voyager 1'' is a space probe launched by NASA on September 5, 1977, as part of the Voyager program to study the outer Solar System and interstellar space beyond the Sun's heliosphere. Launched 16 days after its twin ''Voyager 2'', ''Voya ...
'' is moving in the direction of this constellation, though it will not be nearing any of the stars in this constellation for many thousands of years, by which time its power source will be long dead.
History
Camelopardalis is not one of
Ptolemy
Claudius Ptolemy (; grc-gre, Πτολεμαῖος, ; la, Claudius Ptolemaeus; AD) was a mathematician, astronomer, astrologer, geographer, and music theorist, who wrote about a dozen scientific treatises, three of which were of importanc ...
's 48 constellations in the ''
Almagest
The ''Almagest'' is a 2nd-century Greek-language mathematical and astronomical treatise on the apparent motions of the stars and planetary paths, written by Claudius Ptolemy ( ). One of the most influential scientific texts in history, it canoni ...
''. It was created by Petrus Plancius in 1613. It first appeared in a globe designed by him and produced by Pieter van den Keere. One year later,
Jakob Bartsch
Jakob Bartsch or Jacobus Bartschius (c. 1600 – 26 December 1633) was a German astronomer.
Biography
Bartsch was born in Lauban (Lubań) in Lusatia. He was taught how to use the astrolabe by Sarcephalus (Christopher Hauptfleisch), a librar ...
featured it in his atlas. Johannes Hevelius depicted this constellation in his works which were so influential that it was referred to as Camelopardali Hevelii or abbreviated as Camelopard. Hevel.
Part of the constellation was hived off to form the constellation Sciurus Volans, the Flying Squirrel, by William Croswell in 1810. However this was not taken up by later cartographers.
Equivalents
In
Chinese astronomy
Astronomy in China has a long history stretching from the Shang dynasty, being refined over a period of more than 3,000 years. The ancient Chinese people have identified stars from 1300 BCE, as Chinese star names later categorized in the twe ...
, the stars of Camelopardalis are located within a group of circumpolar stars called the Purple Forbidden Enclosure (紫微垣 ''Zǐ Wēi Yuán'').