"giant of spectral type O8 III and apparent magnitude 3.54, which lies some 1100 light years distant. Phi-1 and Phi-2 Orionis make up the base. Also nearby is the very young star FU Orionis. Stretching north from Betelgeuse are the stars that make up Orion's club. Mu Orionis marks the elbow, Nu and Xi mark the handle of the club, and Chi and Chi mark the end of the club. Just east of Chi is the Mira-type variable red giant U Orionis. West from Bellatrix lie six stars all designated Pi Orionis (π Ori, π Ori, π Ori, π Ori,"
"Betelgeuse, Bellatrix and Saiph. Consequently, Rigel are known as (, ). In Japan, the Minamoto or Genji clan chose Rigel and its white color as its symbol, calling the star ""Genji-boshi"" (), while the Taira or Heike clan adopted Betelgeuse and its red color. The two powerful families fought a legendary war in Japanese history, the stars seen as facing each other off and only kept apart by the Belt. Rigel was also known as ""Gin-waki"", (), ""the Silver (Star) beside (""Mitsu-boshi"")"". Rigel was known as ""Yerrerdet-kurrk"" to the Wotjobaluk koori of southeastern Australia, and held to be the mother-in-law"
"Pictor Pictor is a constellation in the Southern Celestial Hemisphere, located between the star Canopus and the Large Magellanic Cloud. Its name is Latin for painter, and is an abbreviation of the older name Equuleus Pictoris (the ""painter's easel""). Normally represented as an easel, Pictor was named by Abbé Nicolas-Louis de Lacaille in the 18th century. The constellation's brightest star is Alpha Pictoris, a white main-sequence star around 97 light-years away from Earth. Pictor also hosts RR Pictoris, a cataclysmic variable star system that flared up as a nova, reaching apparent (visual) magnitude 1.2 in 1925 before fading into obscurity."
"Orionis (Alnilam), and Delta Orionis (Mintaka). However, this is no longer believed to be the case, as Bellatrix is now known to be much closer than the rest of the group. It is not known to have a stellar companion, although researchers Maria-Fernanda Nieva and Norbert Przybilla raised the possibility it might be a spectroscopic binary. A 2011 search for nearby companions failed to conclusively find any objects that share a proper motion with Bellatrix. Three nearby candidates were all found to be background stars. Bellatrix has been used as both a photometric and spectral standard star, but both characteristics"
"Reticulum Reticulum is a small, faint constellation in the southern sky. Its name is Latin for a small net, or reticle—a net of crosshairs at the focus of a telescope eyepiece that is used to measure star positions. The constellation is best viewed between October and December, but cannot be seen from middle to northern latitudes. A constellation in this area was introduced by Isaac Habrecht II in his celestial globe in 1621, who named it ""Rhombus"". It was replaced with a somewhat different constellation by the French astronomer Nicolas Louis de Lacaille in the eighteenth century; during his stay"
"Betelgeuse"" by Robert R. Chase and ""Calculating God"" by Robert J. Sawyer, below). Betelgeuse is the eighth-brightest star in the night sky and second-brightest star in the constellation of Orion, outshining its neighbour Rigel (Beta Orionis) only rarely. Distinctly reddish-tinted, it is a semiregular variable star whose apparent magnitude oscillates between 0.2 and 1.2, the widest range of any first magnitude star. It marks the upper right vertex of the Winter Triangle and center of the Winter Hexagon. There is considerable controversy about the Arabic language origin of the name Betelgeuse, with some dozens of possible derivations and spellings proposed"
"are defined by a 17-sided polygon. In the equatorial coordinate system, the right ascension coordinates of these borders lie between and , while the declination coordinates are between and . The International Astronomical Union (IAU) adopted the three-letter abbreviation ""Lyr"" for the constellation in 1922. The brightest and by far the most well-known star in the constellation is Vega, a main-sequence star of spectral type A0Va. Only 7.7 parsecs distant, is a Delta Scuti variable, varying between magnitudes −0.02 and 0.07 over 0.2 days. On average, it is the second-brightest star of the northern hemisphere (after Arcturus) and the fifth-brightest"
"""Rigel"", though that is ambiguous with Beta Orionis, which is also called Rigel. The name ""Toliman"" originates with Jacobus Golius' 1669 edition of Al-Farghani's ""Compendium"". ""Tolimân"" is Golius' latinisation of the Arabic name ""the ostriches"", the name of an asterism of which Alpha Centauri formed the main star. During the 19th century, the northern amateur popularist Elijah H. Burritt used the now-obscure name ""Bungula"", possibly coined from ""β"" and the Latin ""ungula"" (""hoof""). Together, Alpha and Beta Centauri form the ""Southern Pointers"" or ""The Pointers"", as they point towards the Southern Cross, the asterism of the constellation of Crux. In"
"of one another by following various lines traced through various stars in Orion. The stars in the hexagon are parts of six constellations. Counter-clockwise around the hexagon, starting with Rigel, these are Orion, Taurus, Auriga, Gemini, Canis Minor, and Canis Major. Winter Hexagon The Winter Hexagon or Winter Circle/Oval is an asterism appearing to be in the form of a hexagon with vertices at Rigel, Aldebaran, Capella, Pollux, Procyon, and Sirius. It is mostly upon the Northern Hemisphere's celestial sphere. On most locations on Earth (except the South Island of New Zealand and the south of Chile and Argentina and"
"years. Rigel Bb may itself be a spectroscopic binary system, consisting of two main sequence stars that orbit each other every 9.86 days. The stars both belong to the spectral class B9. These two stars do not appear to make up the visual binary components of B or C, so the B sub-system might be a triple star, although the true arrangement of them is unclear. A 15.4 magnitude star at 44.6 arcsec in north position angle of 1° is catalogued as component D in the system although it is unclear whether it is physically related or a coincidental alignment."
"Kappa Reticuli Kappa Reticuli (κ Reticuli) is a binary star system in the southern constellation of Reticulum. It is visible to the naked eye, having a combined apparent visual magnitude of +4.71. Based upon an annual parallax shift of 46.12 mas as seen from Earth, it is located 71 light years from the Sun. Based upon its space velocity components, this star is a member of the Hyades supercluster of stars that share a common motion through space. Houk and Cowley (1978) catalogued the yellow-hued primary, component A, with a stellar classification of F3 IV/V, indicating this is an F-type"
"along arcs of right ascension and declination for epoch 1875. These were published in 1930 in the ""Delimination Scientifique des Constellations"" at the behest of the IAU. Only two of the stars in this constellation are brighter than visual magnitude 5: Alpha (α) and Beta (β) reticuli. The reddish star R Reticuli is a Mira variable. This variable was discovered by C. Ragoonatha Chary at the Madras Observatory in India. The binary star system Epsilon Reticuli consists of a spectral class K2IV star being orbited by a white dwarf. Based on parallax measurements, this system is located about 50 light"
"is now so entered in the IAU Catalog of Star Names. The apparent visual magnitude of Rigel is 0.13, making it on average the seventh-brightest star in the celestial sphere excluding the Sun—just fainter than Capella. It is an irregular pulsating variable with a visual range of magnitude 0.05–0.18. Although Rigel has the Bayer designation ""beta"", it is almost always brighter than Alpha Orionis (Betelgeuse). Since 1943, the spectrum of this star has served as one of the stable anchor points by which other stars are classified. Rigel is the third most inherently luminous first magnitude star after Deneb and"
"Virgo (constellation) Virgo is one of the constellations of the zodiac. Its name is Latin for virgin, and its symbol is ♍. Lying between Leo to the west and Libra to the east, it is the second-largest constellation in the sky (after Hydra) and the largest constellation in the zodiac. It can be easily found through its brightest star, Spica. The bright star Spica makes it easy to locate Virgo, as it can be found by following the curve of the Big Dipper/Plough to Arcturus in Boötes and continuing from there in the same curve (""follow the arc to Arcturus"
"Lion:the King."" Regulus Regulus, also designated Alpha Leonis (α Leonis, abbreviated Alpha Leo, α Leo), is the brightest star in the constellation of Leo and one of the brightest stars in the night sky, lying approximately 79 light years from the Sun. Regulus is a multiple star system composed of four stars that are organized into two pairs. The spectroscopic binary Regulus A consists of a blue-white main-sequence star and its companion, which has not yet been directly observed, but is probably a white dwarf. Located farther away are Regulus B, C, and D, which are dim main-sequence stars. ""α"
"Beta Reticuli Beta Reticuli (Beta Ret, β Reticuli, β Ret) is binary star system in southern constellation of Reticulum. It is visible to the naked eye with an apparent visual magnitude of +3.84. Based upon an annual parallax shift of 33.49 mas, it is located some 97 light years from the Sun. This is a single-lined spectroscopic binary with an orbital period of 5.25 years and an eccentricity of 0.33. The primary, component A, is an evolved K-type giant star with a stellar classification of K0 IVSB:, with the 'b' notation indicating it is presently in the red clump. It"
"that the coordinates were mistranscribed 32 in error by Flamsteed and in fact referred to 7.4 magnitude HD 10407. Baily also noted that 16 Trianguli was closer to Aries and included it in the latter constellation. Three stars make up the long narrow triangle that gives the constellation its name. The brightest member is the white giant star Beta Trianguli of apparent magnitude 3.00, lying 127 light-years distant from Earth. It is actually a spectroscopic binary system; the primary is a white star of spectral type A5IV with 3.5 times the mass of our sun that is beginning to expand"
"Alpha Reticuli Alpha Reticuli (Alpha Ret, α Reticuli, α Ret) is the Bayer designation of the brightest star in the southern circumpolar constellation of Reticulum, with an apparent visual magnitude of 3.3. This appears to be a solitary star located at a distance of 162 light-years from Earth. Although it is bright enough to be seen with the naked eye, the declination of this star means that it is best viewed from the southern hemisphere and is only readily visible below the tropic of cancer. This star has more than three times the mass of the Sun and is about"
"the B2 III type. The expected brightness of Bellatrix from this spectral type is about one magnitude brighter than calculated from its apparent magnitude and Hipparcos distance. Analysis of the observed characteristics of the star indicate that it should be a B2 main sequence star, not the giant that it appears from its spectral type. Close analysis of high resolution spectra suggest that it is a spectroscopic binary composed of two similar stars less luminous than a B2 giant. ""Gamma Orionis"" is the star's Bayer designation. The traditional name ""Bellatrix"" is Latin for ""female warrior""; it first appeared in the"
"Zeta Reticuli Zeta Reticuli (Zeta Ret, ζ Reticuli, ζ Ret) is a wide binary star system in the southern constellation of Reticulum. From the southern hemisphere the pair can be seen as a naked eye double star in very dark skies. Based upon parallax measurements, this system is located at a distance of about from the Earth. Both stars are solar analogs that have characteristics similar to those of the Sun. They belong to the Zeta Herculis Moving Group of stars that share a common origin. At a declination of −62°, the system is not visible from Britain's latitude of"
"this system. Epsilon Reticuli Epsilon Reticuli (Epsilon Ret, ε Reticuli, ε Ret) is a double star approximately 59 light-years away in the constellation of Reticulum. The primary component is an orange subgiant, while the secondary is a white dwarf. The two stars share a common motion through space and hence most likely form a binary star system. The brighter star should be easily visible without optical aid under dark skies in the southern hemisphere. In 2000, an extrasolar planet was confirmed to be orbiting the primary star in the system. The primary component, Epsilon Reticuli A, is a subgiant star"
"Regulus Regulus, also designated Alpha Leonis (α Leonis, abbreviated Alpha Leo, α Leo), is the brightest star in the constellation of Leo and one of the brightest stars in the night sky, lying approximately 79 light years from the Sun. Regulus is a multiple star system composed of four stars that are organized into two pairs. The spectroscopic binary Regulus A consists of a blue-white main-sequence star and its companion, which has not yet been directly observed, but is probably a white dwarf. Located farther away are Regulus B, C, and D, which are dim main-sequence stars. ""α Leonis"" (Latinized"
"Epsilon Reticuli Epsilon Reticuli (Epsilon Ret, ε Reticuli, ε Ret) is a double star approximately 59 light-years away in the constellation of Reticulum. The primary component is an orange subgiant, while the secondary is a white dwarf. The two stars share a common motion through space and hence most likely form a binary star system. The brighter star should be easily visible without optical aid under dark skies in the southern hemisphere. In 2000, an extrasolar planet was confirmed to be orbiting the primary star in the system. The primary component, Epsilon Reticuli A, is a subgiant star with a"
"point of the spectral classification sequence for supergiants. However the details of the spectrum vary considerably owing to periodic atmospheric eruptions. The spectral lines show emission, absorption, line doubling, P Cygni profiles, and inverse P Cygni profiles, with no obvious periodicity. This has resulted in classification as B8 Iab, B8 Iae, or blendings by different authors. In ancient Egypt, Rigel's name was S29-Aa17-V28-D61-N14:N35Seba-en-Sah ""Sb3-n-S3ḥ"", which means ""toe star"" or ""foot star"". Rigel is presumably the star known as ""Aurvandil's toe"" in Norse mythology. In Chinese, (), meaning ""Three Stars (asterism)"", refers to an asterism consisting of Rigel, Alnitak, Alnilam, Mintaka,"
"Phi Virginis Phi Virginis (φ Virginis, abbreviated Phi Vir, φ Vir) is a binary star in the zodiac constellation of Virgo. It can be seen with the naked eye, having an apparent visual magnitude of +4.81. Based upon parallax measurements obtained during the Hipparcos mission, it is located roughly distant from the Sun. The two components are designated Phi Virginis A (also named Elgafar) and B. ""φ Virginis"" (Latinised to ""Phi Virginis"") is the binary's Bayer designation. The designations of the two components as ""Phi Virginis A"" and ""B"" derive from the convention used by the Washington Multiplicity Catalog (WMC)"
"are not visible to the naked eye. The members that are visible to the naked eye are: The group covers a region of space for the most part visible only in the Southern Hemisphere, and lies in the constellations Eridanus, Lepus, Pictor, Scorpius, Fornax, Triangulum Australe and Telescopium. An early estimated age for the star Beta Pictoris at about 10 million years proved problematic due to the star's apparent isolation in space. According to current theory regarding stellar evolution, extremely young stars of this age should be located near other young stars that formed from the same region in space."
"the Sun making it one of the most luminous stars in the Milky Way. Pistol Nebula The Pistol Nebula is located in the constellation Sagittarius. It surrounds one of the most luminous stars known, the Pistol Star. Both are located 25,000 light years away from Earth in the Quintuplet cluster, near the center of the Milky Way galaxy. The nebula contains approximately 9.3 solar masses worth of ionized gas that was ejected by the star several thousand years ago. The nebula was named in the 1980s for its shape as seen in low resolution images that were available at the"
"Sagittarius (constellation) Sagittarius is one of the constellations of the zodiac. It is one of the 48 constellations listed by the 2nd-century astronomer Ptolemy and remains one of the 88 modern constellations. Its name is Latin for the archer, and its symbol is (Unicode U+2650 ♐), a stylized arrow. Sagittarius is commonly represented as a centaur pulling back a bow. It lies between Scorpius and Ophiuchus to the west and Capricornus and Microscopium to the east. The center of the Milky Way lies in the westernmost part of Sagittarius (see Sagittarius A). As seen from the northern hemisphere, the constellation's"
"lack an alpha star altogether. (Constellations with no alpha include Vela and Puppis – both formerly part of Argo Navis, whose alpha is Canopus in Carina.) Orion provides a good example of Bayer's method. Bayer first designated Betelgeuse and Rigel, the two 1st-magnitude stars (those of magnitude 1.5 or less), as Alpha and Beta from north to south, with Betelgeuse (the shoulder) coming ahead of Rigel (the foot), even though the latter is usually the brighter. (Betelgeuse is a variable star and can at its maximum occasionally outshine Rigel.) Bayer then repeated the procedure for the stars of the 2nd"
"Wolf 424 Wolf 424 is a binary star system comprising two red dwarf stars at a distance of approximately 14.2 light years from the Sun. It is located in the constellation Virgo, between the stars ε Virginis and ο Virginis. The close binary nature of this star was discovered by Dutch American astronomer Dirk Reuyl in 1941, based upon an elongation of the star found in photographs. The two stars in the Wolf 424 system orbit about each other with a semi-major axis of 4.1 AU and an eccentricity of 0.3. The stars have an orbital period of 15.5 years"
"in front of the host star. Within the constellation's borders lie NGC 2419, an unusually remote globular cluster; the galaxy NGC 2770, which has hosted three recent Type Ib supernovae; the distant quasar APM 08279+5255, whose light is magnified and split into multiple images by the gravitational lensing effect of a foreground galaxy; and the Lynx Supercluster, which was the most distant supercluster known at the time of its discovery in 1999. Polish astronomer Johannes Hevelius formed the constellation in 1687 from 19 faint stars between the constellations Ursa Major and Auriga that earlier had been part of the obsolete"
"of its proximity to the Solar System. In contrast, the other bright stars of the constellation are stars of great distance and high luminosity. At magnitude 1.5, Epsilon Canis Majoris (Adhara) is the second-brightest star of the constellation and the brightest source of extreme ultraviolet radiation in the night sky. Next in brightness are the yellow-white supergiant Delta (Wezen) at 1.8, the blue-white giant Beta (Mirzam) at 2.0, blue-white supergiants Eta (Aludra) at 2.4 and Omicron at 3.0, and white spectroscopic binary Zeta (Furud), also at 3.0. The red hypergiant VY Canis Majoris is one of the largest stars known,"
"Red Rectangle Nebula The Red Rectangle Nebula, so called because of its red color and unique rectangular shape, is a protoplanetary nebula in the Monoceros constellation. Also known as HD 44179, the nebula was discovered in 1973 during a rocket flight associated with the AFCRL Infrared Sky Survey called Hi Star. The binary system at the center of the nebula was first discovered by Robert Grant Aitken in 1915. High-resolution images of it in visible and near infrared light reveal a highly symmetric, compact bipolar nebula with X-shaped spikes which imply anisotropic dispersion of the circumstellar material. The central binary"