Edward Emerson Barnard was an American astronomer. He was commonly known as E. E. Barnard, and was recognized as a gifted observational astronomer. He is best known for his discovery of the high proper motion of Barnard's Star in 1916, which is named in his honor.
Edward Emerson Barnard
Barnard at the Fourth Conference International Union for Cooperation in Solar Research at Mount Wilson Observatory, 1910
Barnard's Star is a small red dwarf star in the constellation of Ophiuchus. At a distance of 5.96 light-years (1.83 pc) from Earth, it is the fourth-nearest-known individual star to the Sun after the three components of the Alpha Centauri system, and is the closest star in the northern celestial hemisphere. Its stellar mass is about 16% of the Sun's, and it has 19% of the Sun's diameter. Despite its proximity, the star has a dim apparent visual magnitude of +9.5 and is invisible to the unaided eye; it is much brighter in the infrared than in visible light.
Artist's conception of a planet in orbit around a red dwarf
Artist's impression of the surface of a super-Earth orbiting Barnard's Star
Artist's conception of a red dwarf