1.
New General Catalogue
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The NGC contains 7,840 objects, known as the NGC objects. It is one of the largest comprehensive catalogues, as it includes all types of space objects and is not confined to, for example. Dreyer also published two supplements to the NGC in 1895 and 1908, known as the Index Catalogues, describing a further 5,386 astronomical objects. Objects in the sky of the southern hemisphere are catalogued somewhat less thoroughly, the Revised New General Catalogue and Index Catalogue was compiled in 2009 by Wolfgang Steinicke. The original New General Catalogue was compiled during the 1880s by John Louis Emil Dreyer using observations from William Herschel and his son John, Dreyer had already published a supplement to Herschels General Catalogue of Nebulae and Clusters, containing about 1,000 new objects. In 1886, he suggested building a second supplement to the General Catalogue and this led to the publication of the New General Catalogue in the Memoirs of the Royal Astronomical Society in 1888. Assembling the NGC was a challenge, as Dreyer had to deal with many contradicting and unclear reports, while he did check some himself, the sheer number of objects meant Dreyer had to accept them as published by others for the purpose of his compilation. Dreyer was a careful transcriber and made few errors himself, and he was very thorough in his referencing, which allowed future astronomers to review the original references and publish corrections to the original NGC. The first major update to the NGC is the Index Catalogue of Nebulae and Clusters of Stars and it serves as a supplement to the NGC, and contains an additional 5,386 objects, collectively known as the IC objects. It summarizes the discoveries of galaxies, clusters and nebulae between 1888 and 1907, most of them made possible by photography, a list of corrections to the IC was published in 1912. The Revised New Catalogue of Nonstellar Astronomical Objects was compiled by Jack W. Sulentic and William G. Tifft in the early 1970s, and was published in 1973, as an update to the NGC. However, because the update had to be completed in just three summers, it failed to incorporate several previously-published corrections to the NGC data, and even introduced new errors. NGC2000.0 is a 1988 compilation of the NGC and IC made by Roger W. Sinnott and it incorporates several corrections and errata made by astronomers over the years. However, it too ignored the original publications and favoured modern corrections, the NGC/IC Project is a collaboration formed in 1993. It aims to identify all NGC and IC objects, and collect images, the Revised New General Catalogue and Index Catalogue is a compilation made by Wolfgang Steinicke in 2009. It is considered one of the most comprehensive and authoritative treatments of the NGC, messier object Catalogue of Nebulae and Clusters of Stars The Interactive NGC Catalog Online Adventures in Deep Space, Challenging Observing Projects for Amateur Astronomers
2.
Constellation
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A constellation is formally defined as a region of the celestial sphere, with boundaries laid down by the International Astronomical Union. The constellation areas mostly had their origins in Western-traditional patterns of stars from which the constellations take their names, in 1922, the International Astronomical Union officially recognized the 88 modern constellations, which cover the entire sky. They began as the 48 classical Greek constellations laid down by Ptolemy in the Almagest, Constellations in the far southern sky are late 16th- and mid 18th-century constructions. 12 of the 88 constellations compose the zodiac signs, though the positions of the constellations only loosely match the dates assigned to them in astrology. The term constellation can refer to the stars within the boundaries of that constellation. Notable groupings of stars that do not form a constellation are called asterisms, when astronomers say something is “in” a given constellation they mean it is within those official boundaries. Any given point in a coordinate system can unambiguously be assigned to a single constellation. Many astronomical naming systems give the constellation in which an object is found along with a designation in order to convey a rough idea in which part of the sky it is located. For example, the Flamsteed designation for bright stars consists of a number, the word constellation seems to come from the Late Latin term cōnstellātiō, which can be translated as set of stars, and came into use in English during the 14th century. It also denotes 88 named groups of stars in the shape of stellar-patterns, the Ancient Greek word for constellation was ἄστρον. Colloquial usage does not draw a distinction between constellation in the sense of an asterism and constellation in the sense of an area surrounding an asterism. The modern system of constellations used in astronomy employs the latter concept, the term circumpolar constellation is used for any constellation that, from a particular latitude on Earth, never sets below the horizon. From the North Pole or South Pole, all constellations south or north of the equator are circumpolar constellations. In the equatorial or temperate latitudes, the term equatorial constellation has sometimes been used for constellations that lie to the opposite the circumpolar constellations. They generally include all constellations that intersect the celestial equator or part of the zodiac, usually the only thing the stars in a constellation have in common is that they appear near each other in the sky when viewed from the Earth. In galactic space, the stars of a constellation usually lie at a variety of distances, since stars also travel on their own orbits through the Milky Way, the star patterns of the constellations change slowly over time. After tens to hundreds of thousands of years, their familiar outlines will become unrecognisable, the terms chosen for the constellation themselves, together with the appearance of a constellation, may reveal where and when its constellation makers lived. The earliest direct evidence for the constellations comes from inscribed stones and it seems that the bulk of the Mesopotamian constellations were created within a relatively short interval from around 1300 to 1000 BC
3.
Virgo (constellation)
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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. It can be found through its brightest star, Spica. The bright 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. Due to the effects of precession, the First Point of Libra and this is one of the two points in the sky where the celestial equator crosses the ecliptic This point will pass into the neighbouring constellation of Leo around the year 2440. Besides Spica, other stars in Virgo include β Virginis, γ Vir, δ Virginis. Other fainter stars that were given names are ζ Virginis, η Virginis, ι Virginis. The star 70 Virginis has one of the first known extrasolar planetary systems with one confirmed planet 7.5 times the mass of Jupiter, the star Chi Virginis has one of the most massive planets ever detected, at a mass of 11.1 times that of Jupiter. The sun-like star 61 Virginis has three planets, one is a super-Earth and two are Neptune-mass planets, SS Virginis is a variable star with a noticeable red color. It varies in magnitude from a minimum of 9.6 to a maximum of 6.0 over a period of one year. There are 35 verified exoplanets orbiting 29 stars in Virgo, including PSR B1257+12,70 Virginis, Chi Virginis,61 Virginis, NY Virginis, and 59 Virginis. Because of the presence of a cluster within its borders 5° to 12° west of ε Vir. Some examples are Messier 49, Messier 58, Messier 59, Messier 60, Messier 61, Messier 84, Messier 86, Messier 87, Messier 89, a noted galaxy that is not part of the cluster is the Sombrero Galaxy, an unusual spiral galaxy. It is located about 10° due west of Spica, NGC4639 is a face-on barred spiral galaxy located 78 Mly from Earth. Its outer arms have a number of Cepheid variables, which are used as standard candles to determine astronomical distances. Because of this, astronomers used several Cepheid variables in NGC4639 to calibrate type 1a supernovae as standard candles for more distant galaxies, Virgo possesses several galaxy clusters, one of which is HCG62. A Hickson Compact Group, HCG62 is at a distance of 200 Mly from Earth and it has a heterogeneous halo of extremely hot gas, posited to be due to the active galactic nucleus at the core of the central elliptical galaxy. M87 is the largest galaxy in the Virgo cluster, and is at a distance of 60 Mly from Earth and it is a major radio source, partially due to its jet of electrons being flung out of the galaxy by its central supermassive black hole
4.
Right ascension
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Right ascension is the angular distance measured eastward along the celestial equator from the vernal equinox to the hour circle of the point in question. When combined with declination, these astronomical coordinates specify the direction of a point on the sphere in the equatorial coordinate system. Right ascension is the equivalent of terrestrial longitude. Both right ascension and longitude measure an angle from a direction on an equator. Right ascension is measured continuously in a circle from that equinox towards the east. Any units of measure could have been chosen for right ascension, but it is customarily measured in hours, minutes. Astronomers have chosen this unit to measure right ascension because they measure a stars location by timing its passage through the highest point in the sky as the Earth rotates. The highest point in the sky, called meridian, is the projection of a line onto the celestial sphere. A full circle, measured in units, contains 24 × 60 × 60 = 86 400s, or 24 × 60 = 1 440m. Because right ascensions are measured in hours, they can be used to time the positions of objects in the sky. For example, if a star with RA = 01h 30m 00s is on the meridian, sidereal hour angle, used in celestial navigation, is similar to right ascension, but increases westward rather than eastward. Usually measured in degrees, it is the complement of right ascension with respect to 24h and it is important not to confuse sidereal hour angle with the astronomical concept of hour angle, which measures angular distance of an object westward from the local meridian. The Earths axis rotates slowly westward about the poles of the ecliptic and this effect, known as precession, causes the coordinates of stationary celestial objects to change continuously, if rather slowly. Therefore, equatorial coordinates are inherently relative to the year of their observation, coordinates from different epochs must be mathematically rotated to match each other, or to match a standard epoch. The right ascension of Polaris is increasing quickly, the North Ecliptic Pole in Draco and the South Ecliptic Pole in Dorado are always at right ascension 18h and 6h respectively. The currently used standard epoch is J2000.0, which is January 1,2000 at 12,00 TT, the prefix J indicates that it is a Julian epoch. Prior to J2000.0, astronomers used the successive Besselian Epochs B1875.0, B1900.0, the concept of right ascension has been known at least as far back as Hipparchus who measured stars in equatorial coordinates in the 2nd century BC. But Hipparchus and his successors made their star catalogs in ecliptic coordinates, the easiest way to do that is to use an equatorial mount, which allows the telescope to be aligned with one of its two pivots parallel to the Earths axis
5.
Declination
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In astronomy, declination is one of the two angles that locate a point on the celestial sphere in the equatorial coordinate system, the other being hour angle. Declinations angle is measured north or south of the celestial equator, the root of the word declination means a bending away or a bending down. It comes from the root as the words incline and recline. Declination in astronomy is comparable to geographic latitude, projected onto the celestial sphere, points north of the celestial equator have positive declinations, while those south have negative declinations. Any units of measure can be used for declination, but it is customarily measured in the degrees, minutes. Declinations with magnitudes greater than 90° do not occur, because the poles are the northernmost and southernmost points of the celestial sphere, the Earths axis rotates slowly westward about the poles of the ecliptic, completing one circuit in about 26,000 years. This effect, known as precession, causes the coordinates of stationary celestial objects to change continuously, therefore, equatorial coordinates are inherently relative to the year of their observation, and astronomers specify them with reference to a particular year, known as an epoch. Coordinates from different epochs must be rotated to match each other. The currently used standard epoch is J2000.0, which is January 1,2000 at 12,00 TT, the prefix J indicates that it is a Julian epoch. Prior to J2000.0, astronomers used the successive Besselian Epochs B1875.0, B1900.0, the declinations of Solar System objects change very rapidly compared to those of stars, due to orbital motion and close proximity. This similarly occurs in the Southern Hemisphere for objects with less than −90° − φ. An extreme example is the star which has a declination near to +90°. Circumpolar stars never dip below the horizon, conversely, there are other stars that never rise above the horizon, as seen from any given point on the Earths surface. Generally, if a star whose declination is δ is circumpolar for some observer, then a star whose declination is −δ never rises above the horizon, as seen by the same observer. Likewise, if a star is circumpolar for an observer at latitude φ, neglecting atmospheric refraction, declination is always 0° at east and west points of the horizon. At the north point, it is 90° − |φ|, and at the south point, from the poles, declination is uniform around the entire horizon, approximately 0°. Non-circumpolar stars are visible only during certain days or seasons of the year, the Suns declination varies with the seasons. As seen from arctic or antarctic latitudes, the Sun is circumpolar near the summer solstice, leading to the phenomenon of it being above the horizon at midnight
6.
Redshift
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In physics, redshift happens when light or other electromagnetic radiation from an object is increased in wavelength, or shifted to the red end of the spectrum. Some redshifts are an example of the Doppler effect, familiar in the change of apparent pitches of sirens, a redshift occurs whenever a light source moves away from an observer. Finally, gravitational redshift is an effect observed in electromagnetic radiation moving out of gravitational fields. However, redshift is a common term and sometimes blueshift is referred to as negative redshift. Knowledge of redshifts and blueshifts has been applied to develop several terrestrial technologies such as Doppler radar and radar guns, Redshifts are also seen in the spectroscopic observations of astronomical objects. Its value is represented by the letter z, a special relativistic redshift formula can be used to calculate the redshift of a nearby object when spacetime is flat. However, in contexts, such as black holes and Big Bang cosmology. Special relativistic, gravitational, and cosmological redshifts can be understood under the umbrella of frame transformation laws, the history of the subject began with the development in the 19th century of wave mechanics and the exploration of phenomena associated with the Doppler effect. The effect is named after Christian Doppler, who offered the first known physical explanation for the phenomenon in 1842, the hypothesis was tested and confirmed for sound waves by the Dutch scientist Christophorus Buys Ballot in 1845. Doppler correctly predicted that the phenomenon should apply to all waves, before this was verified, however, it was found that stellar colors were primarily due to a stars temperature, not motion. Only later was Doppler vindicated by verified redshift observations, the first Doppler redshift was described by French physicist Hippolyte Fizeau in 1848, who pointed to the shift in spectral lines seen in stars as being due to the Doppler effect. The effect is called the Doppler–Fizeau effect. In 1868, British astronomer William Huggins was the first to determine the velocity of a moving away from the Earth by this method. In 1871, optical redshift was confirmed when the phenomenon was observed in Fraunhofer lines using solar rotation, about 0.1 Å in the red. In 1887, Vogel and Scheiner discovered the annual Doppler effect, in 1901, Aristarkh Belopolsky verified optical redshift in the laboratory using a system of rotating mirrors. The word does not appear unhyphenated until about 1934 by Willem de Sitter, perhaps indicating that up to point its German equivalent. Beginning with observations in 1912, Vesto Slipher discovered that most spiral galaxies, Slipher first reports on his measurement in the inaugural volume of the Lowell Observatory Bulletin. Three years later, he wrote a review in the journal Popular Astronomy, Slipher reported the velocities for 15 spiral nebulae spread across the entire celestial sphere, all but three having observable positive velocities
7.
Radial velocity
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The radial velocity of an object with respect to a given point is the rate of change of the distance between the object and the point. That is, the velocity is the component of the objects velocity that points in the direction of the radius connecting the object. In astronomy, the point is taken to be the observer on Earth. In astronomy, radial velocity is measured to the first order of approximation by Doppler spectroscopy. The quantity obtained by this method may be called the barycentric radial-velocity measure or spectroscopic radial velocity, by contrast, astrometric radial velocity is determined by astrometric observations. A positive radial velocity indicates the distance between the objects is or was increasing, a radial velocity indicates the distance between the source and observer is or was decreasing. In many binary stars, the orbital motion usually causes radial velocity variations of several kilometers per second, as the spectra of these stars vary due to the Doppler effect, they are called spectroscopic binaries. Radial velocity can be used to estimate the ratio of the masses of the stars and it has been suggested that planets with high eccentricities calculated by this method may in fact be two-planet systems of circular or near-circular resonant orbit. When the star moves towards us, its spectrum is blueshifted, by regularly looking at the spectrum of a star—and so, measuring its velocity—it can be determined, if it moves periodically due to the influence of a companion. From the instrumental perspective, velocities are measured relative to the telescopes motion, in the case of spectroscopic measurements corrections of the order of ±20 cm/s with respect to aberration. Proper motion Peculiar velocity Relative velocity The Radial Velocity Equation in the Search for Exoplanets
8.
Cosmic distance ladder
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The cosmic distance ladder is the succession of methods by which astronomers determine the distances to celestial objects. A real direct distance measurement of an object is possible only for those objects that are close enough to Earth. The techniques for determining distances to more distant objects are all based on various measured correlations between methods that work at distances and methods that work at larger distances. Several methods rely on a candle, which is an astronomical object that has a known luminosity. The ladder analogy arises because no single technique can measure distances at all ranges encountered in astronomy, instead, one method can be used to measure nearby distances, a second can be used to measure nearby to intermediate distances, and so on. Each rung of the ladder provides information that can be used to determine the distances at the next higher rung, at the base of the ladder are fundamental distance measurements, in which distances are determined directly, with no physical assumptions about the nature of the object in question. The precise measurement of stellar positions is part of the discipline of astrometry, direct distance measurements are based upon the astronomical unit, which is the distance between the Earth and the Sun. Historically, observations of transits of Venus were crucial in determining the AU, in the first half of the 20th century, observations of asteroids were also important. Keplers laws provide precise ratios of the sizes of the orbits of objects orbiting the Sun, radar is used to measure the distance between the orbits of the Earth and of a second body. From that measurement and the ratio of the two sizes, the size of Earths orbit is calculated. The Earths orbit is known with a precision of a few meters, the most important fundamental distance measurements come from trigonometric parallax. As the Earth orbits the Sun, the position of stars will appear to shift slightly against the more distant background. These shifts are angles in a triangle, with 2 AU making the base leg of the triangle. The amount of shift is small, measuring 1 arcsecond for an object at the 1 parsec distance of the nearest stars. Astronomers usually express distances in units of parsecs, light-years are used in popular media, because parallax becomes smaller for a greater stellar distance, useful distances can be measured only for stars whose parallax is larger than a few times the precision of the measurement. Parallax measurements typically have an accuracy measured in milliarcseconds, the Hubble telescope WFC3 now has the potential to provide a precision of 20 to 40 microarcseconds, enabling reliable distance measurements up to 5,000 parsecs for small numbers of stars. By the early 2020s, the GAIA space mission will provide similarly accurate distances to all bright stars. Stars have a velocity relative to the Sun that causes proper motion, for a group of stars with the same spectral class and a similar magnitude range, a mean parallax can be derived from statistical analysis of the proper motions relative to their radial velocities
9.
Parsec
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The parsec is a unit of length used to measure large distances to objects outside the Solar System. One parsec is the distance at which one astronomical unit subtends an angle of one arcsecond, a parsec is equal to about 3.26 light-years in length. The nearest star, Proxima Centauri, is about 1.3 parsecs from the Sun, most of the stars visible to the unaided eye in the nighttime sky are within 500 parsecs of the Sun. The parsec unit was likely first suggested in 1913 by the British astronomer Herbert Hall Turner, named from an abbreviation of the parallax of one arcsecond, it was defined so as to make calculations of astronomical distances quick and easy for astronomers from only their raw observational data. Partly for this reason, it is still the unit preferred in astronomy and astrophysics, though the light-year remains prominent in science texts. This corresponds to the definition of the parsec found in many contemporary astronomical references. Derivation, create a triangle with one leg being from the Earth to the Sun. As that point in space away, the angle between the Sun and Earth decreases. A parsec is the length of that leg when the angle between the Sun and Earth is one arc-second. One of the oldest methods used by astronomers to calculate the distance to a star is to record the difference in angle between two measurements of the position of the star in the sky. The first measurement is taken from the Earth on one side of the Sun, and the second is approximately half a year later. The distance between the two positions of the Earth when the two measurements were taken is twice the distance between the Earth and the Sun. The difference in angle between the two measurements is twice the angle, which is formed by lines from the Sun. Then the distance to the star could be calculated using trigonometry. 5-parsec distance of 61 Cygni, the parallax of a star is defined as half of the angular distance that a star appears to move relative to the celestial sphere as Earth orbits the Sun. Equivalently, it is the angle, from that stars perspective. The star, the Sun and the Earth form the corners of a right triangle in space, the right angle is the corner at the Sun. Therefore, given a measurement of the angle, along with the rules of trigonometry. A parsec is defined as the length of the adjacent to the vertex occupied by a star whose parallax angle is one arcsecond
10.
Apparent magnitude
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The apparent magnitude of a celestial object is a number that is a measure of its brightness as seen by an observer on Earth. The brighter an object appears, the lower its magnitude value, the Sun, at apparent magnitude of −27, is the brightest object in the sky. It is adjusted to the value it would have in the absence of the atmosphere, furthermore, the magnitude scale is logarithmic, a difference of one in magnitude corresponds to a change in brightness by a factor of 5√100, or about 2.512. The measurement of apparent magnitudes or brightnesses of celestial objects is known as photometry, apparent magnitudes are used to quantify the brightness of sources at ultraviolet, visible, and infrared wavelengths. An apparent magnitude is measured in a specific passband corresponding to some photometric system such as the UBV system. In standard astronomical notation, an apparent magnitude in the V filter band would be denoted either as mV or often simply as V, the scale used to indicate magnitude originates in the Hellenistic practice of dividing stars visible to the naked eye into six magnitudes. The brightest stars in the sky were said to be of first magnitude, whereas the faintest were of sixth magnitude. Each grade of magnitude was considered twice the brightness of the following grade and this rather crude scale for the brightness of stars was popularized by Ptolemy in his Almagest, and is generally believed to have originated with Hipparchus. This implies that a star of magnitude m is 2.512 times as bright as a star of magnitude m +1 and this figure, the fifth root of 100, became known as Pogsons Ratio. The zero point of Pogsons scale was defined by assigning Polaris a magnitude of exactly 2. However, with the advent of infrared astronomy it was revealed that Vegas radiation includes an Infrared excess presumably due to a disk consisting of dust at warm temperatures. At shorter wavelengths, there is negligible emission from dust at these temperatures, however, in order to properly extend the magnitude scale further into the infrared, this peculiarity of Vega should not affect the definition of the magnitude scale. Therefore, the scale was extrapolated to all wavelengths on the basis of the black body radiation curve for an ideal stellar surface at 11000 K uncontaminated by circumstellar radiation. On this basis the spectral irradiance for the zero magnitude point, with the modern magnitude systems, brightness over a very wide range is specified according to the logarithmic definition detailed below, using this zero reference. In practice such apparent magnitudes do not exceed 30, astronomers have developed other photometric zeropoint systems as alternatives to the Vega system. The AB magnitude zeropoint is defined such that an objects AB, the dimmer an object appears, the higher the numerical value given to its apparent magnitude, with a difference of 5 magnitudes corresponding to a brightness factor of exactly 100. Since an increase of 5 magnitudes corresponds to a decrease in brightness by a factor of exactly 100, each magnitude increase implies a decrease in brightness by the factor 5√100 ≈2.512. Inverting the above formula, a magnitude difference m1 − m2 = Δm implies a brightness factor of F2 F1 =100 Δ m 5 =100.4 Δ m ≈2.512 Δ m
11.
Galaxy morphological classification
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Galaxy morphological classification is a system used by astronomers to divide galaxies into groups based on their visual appearance. The Hubble sequence is a classification scheme for galaxies invented by Edwin Hubble in 1926. It is often known colloquially as the “Hubble tuning-fork” because of the shape in which it is traditionally represented, Hubble’s scheme divides galaxies into three broad classes based on their visual appearance, Elliptical galaxies have smooth, featureless light distributions and appear as ellipses in images. They are denoted by the letter E, followed by an integer n representing their degree of ellipticity on the sky. Spiral galaxies consist of a disk, with stars forming a spiral structure, and a central concentration of stars known as the bulge. They are given the symbol S, roughly half of all spirals are also observed to have a bar-like structure, extending from the central bulge. These barred spirals are given the symbol SB and these broad classes can be extended to enable finer distinctions of appearance and to encompass other types of galaxies, such as irregular galaxies, which have no obvious regular structure. The Hubble sequence is represented in the form of a two-pronged fork, with the ellipticals on the left. Lenticular galaxies are placed between the ellipticals and the spirals, at the point where the two meet the “handle”. To this day, the Hubble sequence is the most commonly used system for classifying galaxies, the de Vaucouleurs system for classifying galaxies is a widely used extension to the Hubble sequence, first described by Gérard de Vaucouleurs in 1959. In particular, he argued that rings and lenses are important structural components of spiral galaxies, the de Vaucouleurs system retains Hubble’s basic division of galaxies into ellipticals, lenticulars, spirals and irregulars. For example, a barred spiral galaxy with loosely wound arms. Visually, the de Vaucouleurs system can be represented as a version of Hubble’s tuning fork, with stage on the x-axis, family on the y-axis. De Vaucouleurs also assigned numerical values to each class of galaxy in his scheme, values of the numerical Hubble stage T run from −6 to +10, with negative numbers corresponding to early-type galaxies and positive numbers to late types. Elliptical galaxies are divided into three stages, compact ellipticals, normal ellipticals and late types, lenticulars are similarly subdivided into early, intermediate and late types. Irregular galaxies can be of type magellanic irregulars or compact, the use of numerical stages allows for more quantitative studies of galaxy morphology. Created by American astronomer William Wilson Morgan, together with Philip Keenan, Morgan developed the MK system for the classification of stars through their spectra. The Yerkes scheme uses the spectra of stars in the galaxy, the shape, real and apparent, thus, for example, the Andromeda Galaxy is classified as kS5. H
12.
Angular diameter
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The angular diameter or apparent size is an angular measurement describing how large a sphere or circle appears from a given point of view. In the vision sciences it is called the angle and in optics it is the angular aperture. The angular diameter can alternatively be thought of as the angle through which an eye or camera must rotate to look from one side of an apparent circle to the opposite side, Angular radius equals half the angular diameter. When D ≫ d, we have δ ≈ d / D, for practical use, the distinction is only significant for spherical objects that are relatively close, since the small-angle approximation holds for x ≪1, arcsin x ≈ arctan x ≈ x. Estimates of angular diameter may be obtained by holding the hand at right angles to an extended arm. In astronomy the sizes of objects in the sky are given in terms of their angular diameter as seen from Earth. Since these angular diameters are typically small, it is common to present them in arcseconds, an arcsecond is 1/3600th of one degree, and a radian is 180/ π degrees, so one radian equals 3600*180/ π arcseconds, which is about 206265 arcseconds. Therefore, the diameter of an object with physical diameter d at a distance D, expressed in arcseconds, is given by. These objects have a diameter of one arcsecond, an object of diameter 725. The angular diameter of the Sun, from a distance of one light-year, is 0. 03″, the angular diameter 0. 03″ of the Sun given above is approximately the same as that of a person at a distance of the diameter of the Earth. Thus the angular diameter of the Sun is about 250,000 times that of Sirius, the angular diameter of the Sun is also about 250,000 times that of Alpha Centauri A. The angular diameter of the Sun is about the same as that of the Moon, even though Pluto is physically larger than Ceres, when viewed from Earth Ceres has a much larger apparent size. While angular sizes measured in degrees are useful for larger patches of sky, we need much finer units when talking about the size of galaxies. The Moons motion across the sky can be measured in size, approximately 15 degrees every hour. A one-mile-long line painted on the face of the Moon would appear to us to be about one arc-second in length, in astronomy, it is typically difficult to directly measure the distance to an object. But the object may have a physical size and a measurable angular diameter. In that case, the angular diameter formula can be inverted to yield the Angular diameter distance to distant objects as d ≡2 D tan . In non-Euclidean space, such as our universe, the angular diameter distance is only one of several definitions of distance
13.
Uppsala General Catalogue
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The Uppsala General Catalogue of Galaxies is a catalogue of 12,921 galaxies visible from the northern hemisphere. It was first published in 1973, the catalogue includes essentially all galaxies north of declination -02°30 and to a limiting diameter of 1.0 arcminute or to a limiting apparent magnitude of 14.5. The primary source of data is the blue prints of the Palomar Observatory Sky Survey and it also includes galaxies smaller than 1.0 arcminute in diameter but brighter than 14.5 magnitude from the Catalogue of Galaxies and of Clusters of Galaxies. The catalogue contains descriptions of the galaxies and their areas, plus conventional system classifications. Galaxy diameters are included and the classifications and descriptions are given in such a way as to provide as accurate an account as possible of the appearance of the galaxies on the prints, the accuracy of coordinates is only what is necessary for identifications purposes. There is an addendum to the catalogue called Uppsala General Catalogue Addendum which is abbreviated as UGCA, Uppsala Uppsala Astronomical Observatory Royal Society of Sciences in Uppsala
14.
Principal Galaxies Catalogue
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The Catalogue of Principal Galaxies is an astronomical catalog published in 1989 that lists B1950 and J2000 equatorial coordinates and cross-identifications for 73,197 galaxies. It is based on the Lyon-Meudon Extragalactic Database, which was started in 1983. 40,932 coordinates have standard deviations smaller than 10″, a total of 131,601 names from the 38 most common sources are listed. The Lyon-Meudon Extragalactic Database was eventually expanded into HyperLEDA, a database of a few million galaxies, Galaxies in the original PGC catalogue are numbered with their original PGC number in HyperLEDA. Numbers have also assigned for the other galaxies, although for those galaxies not in the original PGC catalogue. PGC6240 is a lenticular galaxy in the constellation Hydrus. It is located about 106 million parsecs away from Earth, PGC39058 is a dwarf galaxy which is located approximately 14 million light years away in the constellation of Draco. It is relatively nearby, however it is obscured by a star which is in front of the galaxy. Astronomical catalogue PGC info at ESOs archive of astronomical catalogues PGC readme at Centre de Données astronomiques de Strasbourg
15.
Galaxy
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A galaxy is a gravitationally bound system of stars, stellar remnants, interstellar gas, dust, and dark matter. The word galaxy is derived from the Greek galaxias, literally milky, Galaxies range in size from dwarfs with just a few billion stars to giants with one hundred trillion stars, each orbiting its galaxys center of mass. Galaxies are categorized according to their morphology as elliptical, spiral. Many galaxies are thought to have holes at their active centers. The Milky Ways central black hole, known as Sagittarius A*, has a four million times greater than the Sun. Recent estimates of the number of galaxies in the observable universe range from 200 billion to 2 trillion or more, most of the galaxies are 1,000 to 100,000 parsecs in diameter and separated by distances on the order of millions of parsecs. The space between galaxies is filled with a gas having an average density of less than one atom per cubic meter. The majority of galaxies are organized into groups, clusters. At the largest scale, these associations are generally arranged into sheets and filaments surrounded by immense voids. In Greek mythology, Zeus places his son born by a mortal woman, the infant Heracles, on Heras breast while she is asleep so that the baby will drink her divine milk and will thus become immortal. Hera wakes up while breastfeeding and then realizes she is nursing a baby, she pushes the baby away, some of her milk spills and. In the astronomical literature, the capitalized word Galaxy is often used to refer to our galaxy, the Milky Way, to distinguish it from the other galaxies in our universe. The English term Milky Way can be traced back to a story by Chaucer c. 1380, See yonder, lo, the Galaxyë Which men clepeth the Milky Wey, For hit is whyt. However, the word Universe was later understood to mean the entirety of existence, so this expression fell into disuse and the objects instead became known as galaxies. Tens of thousands of galaxies have been catalogued, but only a few have well-established names, such as the Andromeda Galaxy, the Magellanic Clouds, the Whirlpool Galaxy, and the Sombrero Galaxy. Astronomers work with numbers from certain catalogues, such as the Messier catalogue, the NGC, the IC, the CGCG, all of the well-known galaxies appear in one or more of these catalogues but each time under a different number. For example, Messier 109 is a galaxy having the number 109 in the catalogue of Messier, but also codes NGC3992, UGC6937, CGCG 269-023, MCG +09-20-044. One of the arguments to do so is that these impressive objects deserve better than uninspired codes, for instance, Bodifee and Berger propose the informal, descriptive name Callimorphus Ursae Majoris for the well-formed barred galaxy Messier 109 in Ursa Major
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Lenticular galaxy
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A lenticular galaxy is a type of galaxy intermediate between an elliptical and a spiral galaxy in galaxy morphological classification schemes. Lenticular galaxies are galaxies that have used up or lost most of their interstellar matter. They may, however, retain significant dust in their disks, as a result, they consist mainly of aging stars. Because of their spiral arms, if they are inclined face-on it is often difficult to distinguish between them and elliptical galaxies. Despite the morphological differences, lenticular and elliptical galaxies share common properties like spectral features, both can be considered early-type galaxies that are passively evolving, at least in the local part of the Universe. Lenticular galaxies are unique in that they have a visible disk component as well as a prominent bulge component and they have much higher bulge-to-disk ratios than typical spirals and do not have the canonical spiral arm structure of late-type galaxies, yet may exhibit a central bar. This bulge dominance can be seen in the ratio distribution of a lenticular galaxy sample. The distribution for lenticular galaxies rises steadily in the range 0.25 to 0.85 whereas the distribution for spirals is essentially flat in that same range, larger axial ratios can be explained by observing face-on disk galaxies or by having a sample of spheroidal galaxies. Imagine looking at two disk galaxies edge-on, one with a bulge and one without a bulge, the galaxy with a prominent bulge will have a larger edge-on axial ratio compared to the galaxy without a bulge based on the definition of axial ratio. Thus a sample of galaxies with prominent spheroidal components will have more galaxies at larger axial ratios. The fact that the galaxy distribution rises with increasing observed axial ratio implies that lenticulars are dominated by a central bulge component. Lenticular galaxies are often considered to be a poorly understood transition state between spiral and elliptical galaxies, which results in their placement on the Hubble sequence. This results from lenticulars having both prominent disk and bulge components, the disk component is usually featureless, which precludes a classification system similar to spiral galaxies. As the bulge component is spherical, elliptical galaxy classifications are also unsuitable. Lenticular galaxies are divided into subclasses based upon either the amount of dust present or the prominence of a central bar. While ellipticals and spirals tend to have somewhat well-defined Sérsic profiles, the disk component of lenticular galaxies often has a very flat surface brightness distribution, especially in the outermost regions of the disk. Also, there is typically an observed truncation in the brightness of lenticular galaxies at ~4 scale radii of the disk. These features are consistent with the structure of spiral galaxies
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Solar System
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The Solar System is the gravitationally bound system comprising the Sun and the objects that orbit it, either directly or indirectly. Of those objects that orbit the Sun directly, the largest eight are the planets, with the remainder being significantly smaller objects, such as dwarf planets, of the objects that orbit the Sun indirectly, the moons, two are larger than the smallest planet, Mercury. The Solar System formed 4.6 billion years ago from the collapse of a giant interstellar molecular cloud. The vast majority of the mass is in the Sun. The four smaller inner planets, Mercury, Venus, Earth and Mars, are terrestrial planets, being composed of rock. The four outer planets are giant planets, being more massive than the terrestrials. All planets have almost circular orbits that lie within a flat disc called the ecliptic. The Solar System also contains smaller objects, the asteroid belt, which lies between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter, mostly contains objects composed, like the terrestrial planets, of rock and metal. Beyond Neptunes orbit lie the Kuiper belt and scattered disc, which are populations of trans-Neptunian objects composed mostly of ices, within these populations are several dozen to possibly tens of thousands of objects large enough that they have been rounded by their own gravity. Such objects are categorized as dwarf planets, identified dwarf planets include the asteroid Ceres and the trans-Neptunian objects Pluto and Eris. In addition to two regions, various other small-body populations, including comets, centaurs and interplanetary dust clouds. Six of the planets, at least four of the dwarf planets, each of the outer planets is encircled by planetary rings of dust and other small objects. The solar wind, a stream of charged particles flowing outwards from the Sun, the heliopause is the point at which pressure from the solar wind is equal to the opposing pressure of the interstellar medium, it extends out to the edge of the scattered disc. The Oort cloud, which is thought to be the source for long-period comets, the Solar System is located in the Orion Arm,26,000 light-years from the center of the Milky Way. For most of history, humanity did not recognize or understand the concept of the Solar System, the invention of the telescope led to the discovery of further planets and moons. The principal component of the Solar System is the Sun, a G2 main-sequence star that contains 99. 86% of the known mass. The Suns four largest orbiting bodies, the giant planets, account for 99% of the mass, with Jupiter. The remaining objects of the Solar System together comprise less than 0. 002% of the Solar Systems total mass, most large objects in orbit around the Sun lie near the plane of Earths orbit, known as the ecliptic
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William Herschel
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Frederick William Herschel, KH, FRS was a British astronomer and composer of German origin, and brother of fellow astronomer Caroline Herschel, with whom he worked. Born in the Electorate of Hanover, Herschel followed his father into the Military Band of Hanover, Herschel constructed his first large telescope in 1774, after which he spent nine years carrying out sky surveys to investigate double stars. The resolving power of the Herschel telescopes revealed that the nebulae in the Messier catalogue were clusters of stars, Herschel published catalogues of nebulae in 1802 and in 1820. In the course of an observation on 13 March 1781, he realized that one celestial body he had observed was not a star and this was the first planet to be discovered since antiquity and Herschel became famous overnight. As a result of this discovery, George III appointed him Court Astronomer and he was elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society and grants were provided for the construction of new telescopes. Herschel pioneered the use of astronomical spectrophotometry as a tool, using prisms. Other work included a determination of the rotation period of Mars, the discovery that the Martian polar caps vary seasonally. In addition, Herschel discovered infrared radiation, Herschel was made a Knight of the Royal Guelphic Order in 1816. He was the first President of the Royal Astronomical Society when it was founded in 1820 and he died in August 1822, and his work was continued by his only son, John Herschel. Herschel was born in the Electorate of Hanover in Germany, then part of the Holy Roman Empire and his father was an oboist in the Hanover Military Band. In 1755 the Hanoverian Guards regiment, in whose band Wilhelm, at the time the crowns of Great Britain and Hanover were united under King George II. As the threat of war with France loomed, the Hanoverian Guards were recalled from England to defend Hanover, after they were defeated at the Battle of Hastenbeck, Herschels father Isaak sent his two sons to seek refuge in England in late 1757. Although his older brother Jakob had received his dismissal from the Hanoverian Guards, Wilhelm, nineteen years old at this time, was a quick student of the English language. In England he went by the English rendition of his name, in addition to the oboe, he played the violin and harpsichord and later the organ. He composed numerous works, including 24 symphonies and many concertos. Six of his symphonies were recorded in April 2002 by the London Mozart Players, Herschel moved to Sunderland in 1761 when Charles Avison immediately engaged him as first violin and soloist for his Newcastle orchestra, where he played for one season. In ‘Sunderland in the County of Durh, apprill 20th 1761’ he wrote his Symphony No.8 in C Minor. He was head of the Durham Militia band 1760–61 and visited the home of Sir Ralph Milbanke at Halnaby Hall in 1760, after Newcastle he moved to Leeds and Halifax where he was the first organist at St John the Baptist church
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Spiral arm
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A spiral galaxy is a type of galaxy originally described by Edwin Hubble in his 1936 work The Realm of the Nebulae and, as such, forms part of the Hubble sequence. Spiral galaxies consist of a flat, rotating disk containing stars, gas and dust, and these are surrounded by a much fainter halo of stars, many of which reside in globular clusters. Spiral galaxies are named for the structures that extend from the center into the galactic disc. The spiral arms are sites of ongoing star formation and are brighter than the surrounding disc because of the young, hot OB stars that inhabit them. Roughly two-thirds of all spirals are observed to have a component in the form of a bar-like structure, extending from the central bulge. Our own Milky Way has recently confirmed to be a barred spiral. The most convincing evidence for its existence comes from a recent survey, performed by the Spitzer Space Telescope, together with irregular galaxies, spiral galaxies make up approximately 60% of galaxies in the local Universe. They are mostly found in low-density regions and are rare in the centers of galaxy clusters, Spiral arms are regions of stars that extend from the center of spiral and barred spiral galaxies. These long, thin regions resemble a spiral and thus give spiral galaxies their name, naturally, different classifications of spiral galaxies have distinct arm-structures. Sc and SBc galaxies, for instance, have very loose arms, whereas Sa, either way, spiral arms contain many young, blue stars, which make the arms so bright. A bulge is a huge, tightly packed group of stars, the term commonly refers to the central group of stars found in most spiral galaxies. Using the Hubble classification, the bulge of Sa galaxies is usually composed of Population II stars, further, the bulge of Sa and SBa galaxies tends to be large. In contrast, the bulges of Sc and SBc galaxies are much smaller and are composed of young, some bulges have similar properties to those of elliptical galaxies, others simply appear as higher density centers of disks, with properties similar to disk galaxies. Many bulges are thought to host a supermassive black hole at their centers, such black holes have never been directly observed, but many indirect proofs exist. In our own galaxy, for instance, the object called Sagittarius A* is believed to be a black hole. There is a correlation between the mass of the black hole and the velocity dispersion of the stars in the bulge. However, some stars inhabit a spheroidal halo or galactic spheroid, the orbital behaviour of these stars is disputed, but they may describe retrograde and/or highly inclined orbits, or not move in regular orbits at all. The galactic halo also contains many globular clusters, due to their irregular movement around the center of the galaxy—if they do so at all—these stars often display unusually high proper motion
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Virgo Cluster
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The Virgo Cluster is a cluster of galaxies whose center is 53.8 ±0.3 Mly away in the constellation Virgo. Comprising approximately 1300 member galaxies, the forms the heart of the larger Virgo Supercluster. However, the Local Group experiences the mass of the Virgo Supercluster as the Virgocentric flow and it is estimated that the Virgo Clusters mass is 1. 2×1015 M☉ out to 8 degrees of the clusters center or a radius of about 2.2 Mpc. Described by Messier as nebulae without stars, their nature was not recognized until the 1920s. The cluster subtends an arc of approximately 8 degrees centered in the constellation Virgo. Many of the galaxies of the cluster are visible with a small telescope. Its brightest member is the elliptical galaxy Messier 49, however its most famous member is the elliptical galaxy Messier 87. The cluster is a heterogeneous mixture of spirals and ellipticals. The elliptical galaxies are more concentrated than the spiral galaxies. This strongly suggests the Virgo cluster is a young cluster that is still forming. Other two nearby aggregations known as M Cloud, W Cloud, and W Cloud seem to be background systems independent of the main cluster. The large mass of the cluster is indicated by the peculiar velocities of many of its galaxies, sometimes as high as 1,600 km/s with respect to the clusters center. The Virgo cluster lies within the Virgo Supercluster, and its gravitational effect slows down the nearby galaxies, the large mass of the cluster has the effect of slowing down the recession of the Local Group from the cluster by approximately ten percent. As with many other galaxy clusters, Virgos intracluster medium is filled with a hot. Below is given a table of bright or notable objects in the Virgo Cluster, note that in some cases a galaxy may be considered in one subunit or in another Column 1, The name of the galaxy. Column 2, The right ascension for epoch 2000, Column 3, The declination for epoch 2000. Column 4, The blue apparent magnitude of the galaxy, Column 5, The galaxy type, E=Elliptical, S0=Lenticular, Sa, Sb, Sc, Sd=Spiral, SBa, SBb, SBc, SBd=Barred spiral, Sm, SBm, Irr=Irregular. Column 6, The angular diameter of the galaxy, Column 7, The diameter of the galaxy
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Globular cluster
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A globular cluster is a spherical collection of stars that orbits a galactic core as a satellite. Globular clusters are very tightly bound by gravity, which gives them their spherical shapes, the name of this category of star cluster is derived from the Latin globulus—a small sphere. A globular cluster is known more simply as a globular. Globular clusters are found in the halo of a galaxy and contain considerably more stars and are older than the less dense open clusters. Globular clusters are common, there are about 150 to 158 currently known globular clusters in the Milky Way. These globular clusters orbit the Galaxy at radii of 40 kiloparsecs or more, larger galaxies can have more, Andromeda Galaxy, for instance, may have as many as 500. Some giant elliptical galaxies such as M87, have as many as 13,000 globular clusters, every galaxy of sufficient mass in the Local Group has an associated group of globular clusters, and almost every large galaxy surveyed has been found to possess a system of globular clusters. The Sagittarius Dwarf galaxy and the disputed Canis Major Dwarf galaxy appear to be in the process of donating their associated globular clusters to the Milky Way and this demonstrates how many of this galaxys globular clusters might have been acquired in the past. Although it appears that globular clusters contain some of the first stars to be produced in the galaxy, their origins, the first known globular cluster, now called M22, was discovered in 1665 by Abraham Ihle, a German amateur astronomer. However, given the small aperture of early telescopes, individual stars within a cluster were not resolved until Charles Messier observed M4 in 1764. The first eight globular clusters discovered are shown in the table, subsequently, Abbé Lacaille would list NGC104, NGC4833, M55, M69, and NGC6397 in his 1751–52 catalogue. The M before a number refers to Charles Messiers catalogue, while NGC is from the New General Catalogue by John Dreyer, when William Herschel began his comprehensive survey of the sky using large telescopes in 1782 there were 34 known globular clusters. Herschel discovered another 36 himself and was the first to virtually all of them into stars. He coined the term globular cluster in his Catalogue of a Second Thousand New Nebulae, the number of globular clusters discovered continued to increase, reaching 83 in 1915,93 in 1930 and 97 by 1947. A total of 152 globular clusters have now discovered in the Milky Way galaxy. These additional, undiscovered globular clusters are believed to be hidden behind the gas, beginning in 1914, Harlow Shapley began a series of studies of globular clusters, published in about 40 scientific papers. He examined the RR Lyrae variables in the clusters and would use their period–luminosity relationship for distance estimates, later, it was found that RR Lyrae variables are fainter than Cepheid variables, which caused Shapley to overestimate the distance to the clusters. Of the globular clusters within the Milky Way, the majority are found in a halo around the core
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Supermassive black hole
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In the case of the Milky Way, the SMBH corresponds with the location of Sagittarius A*. Supermassive black holes have properties that distinguish them from lower-mass classifications, first, the average density of a supermassive black hole can be less than the density of water in the case of some supermassive black holes. This is because the Schwarzschild radius is proportional to mass. In addition, the forces in the vicinity of the event horizon are significantly weaker for massive black holes. Unlike with stellar mass black holes, one would not experience significant tidal force until very deep into the black hole, donald Lynden-Bell and Martin Rees hypothesized in 1971 that the center of the Milky Way galaxy would contain a supermassive black hole. Sagittarius A* was discovered and named on February 13 and 15,1974, by astronomers Bruce Balick and they discovered a radio source that emits synchrotron radiation, it was found to be dense and immobile because of its gravitation. This was, therefore, the first indication that a black hole exists in the center of the Milky Way. The origin of black holes remains an open field of research. Astrophysicists agree that once a black hole is in place in the center of a galaxy, it can grow by accretion of matter, there are, however, several hypotheses for the formation mechanisms and initial masses of the progenitors, or seeds, of supermassive black holes. The most obvious hypothesis is that the seeds are black holes of tens or perhaps hundreds of masses that are left behind by the explosions of massive stars. Yet another model involves a dense stellar cluster undergoing core-collapse as the heat capacity of the system drives the velocity dispersion in the core to relativistic speeds. Finally, primordial black holes may have been produced directly from external pressure in the first moments after the Big Bang, formation of black holes from the deaths of the first stars has been extensively studied and corroborated by observations. The other models for black hole formation listed above are theoretical, the difficulty in forming a supermassive black hole resides in the need for enough matter to be in a small enough volume. This matter needs to have very little angular momentum in order for this to happen, normally, the process of accretion involves transporting a large initial endowment of angular momentum outwards, and this appears to be the limiting factor in black hole growth. This is a component of the theory of accretion disks. Gas accretion is the most efficient and also the most conspicuous way in black holes grow. The majority of the growth of supermassive black holes is thought to occur through episodes of rapid gas accretion. Observations reveal that quasars were more frequent when the Universe was younger, indicating that supermassive black holes formed
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Solar mass
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The solar mass is a standard unit of mass in astronomy, equal to approximately 1.99 ×1030 kilograms. It is used to indicate the masses of stars, as well as clusters, nebulae. It is equal to the mass of the Sun, about two kilograms, M☉ = ×1030 kg The above mass is about 332946 times the mass of Earth. Because Earth follows an orbit around the Sun, its solar mass can be computed from the equation for the orbital period of a small body orbiting a central mass. The value he obtained differs by only 1% from the modern value, the diurnal parallax of the Sun was accurately measured during the transits of Venus in 1761 and 1769, yielding a value of 9″. From the value of the parallax, one can determine the distance to the Sun from the geometry of Earth. The first person to estimate the mass of the Sun was Isaac Newton, in his work Principia, he estimated that the ratio of the mass of Earth to the Sun was about 1/28700. Later he determined that his value was based upon a faulty value for the solar parallax and he corrected his estimated ratio to 1/169282 in the third edition of the Principia. The current value for the parallax is smaller still, yielding an estimated mass ratio of 1/332946. As a unit of measurement, the solar mass came into use before the AU, the mass of the Sun has been decreasing since the time it formed. This occurs through two processes in nearly equal amounts, first, in the Suns core, hydrogen is converted into helium through nuclear fusion, in particular the p–p chain, and this reaction converts some mass into energy in the form of gamma ray photons. Most of this energy eventually radiates away from the Sun, second, high-energy protons and electrons in the atmosphere of the Sun are ejected directly into outer space as a solar wind. The original mass of the Sun at the time it reached the main sequence remains uncertain, the early Sun had much higher mass-loss rates than at present, and it may have lost anywhere from 1–7% of its natal mass over the course of its main-sequence lifetime. The Sun gains a small amount of mass through the impact of asteroids. However, as the Sun already contains 99. 86% of the Solar Systems total mass, M☉ G / c2 ≈1.48 km M☉ G / c3 ≈4.93 μs I. -J. A Bright Young Sun Consistent with Helioseismology and Warm Temperatures on Ancient Earth and Mars
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Astronomical interferometer
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The advantage of this technique is that it can theoretically produce images with the angular resolution of a huge telescope with an aperture equal to the separation between the component telescopes. The main drawback is that it does not collect as much light as the complete instruments mirror, thus it is mainly useful for fine resolution of more luminous astronomical objects, such as close binary stars. Another drawback is that the angular size of a detectable emission source is limited by the minimum gap between detectors in the collector array. Interferometry is most widely used in astronomy, in which signals from separate radio telescopes are combined. A mathematical signal processing technique called aperture synthesis is used to combine the signals to create high-resolution images. Practical infrared and optical astronomical interferometers have only recently been developed, at optical wavelengths, aperture synthesis allows the atmospheric seeing resolution limit to be overcome, allowing the angular resolution to reach the diffraction limit of the optics. Astronomical interferometers can produce higher resolution images than any other type of telescope. At radio wavelengths, image resolutions of a few micro-arcseconds have been obtained, one simple layout of an astronomical interferometer is a parabolic arrangement of mirror pieces, giving a partially complete reflecting telescope but with a sparse or dilute aperture. Instead, most existing arrays use a geometry, and Labeyries hypertelescope will use a spherical geometry. One of the first uses of optical interferometry was applied by the Michelson stellar interferometer on the Mount Wilson Observatorys reflector telescope to measure the diameters of stars, the red giant star Betelgeuse was the first to have its diameter determined in this way on December 13,1920. In the 1940s radio interferometry was used to perform the first high resolution radio astronomy observations, optical/infrared interferometry was extended to measurements using separated telescopes by Johnson, Betz and Townes in the infrared and by Labeyrie in the visible. Similar techniques have now been applied at other astronomical telescope arrays, including the Keck Interferometer, software packages such as BSMEM or MIRA are used to convert the measured visibility amplitudes and closure phases into astronomical images. If completed, the MRO Interferometer with up to ten movable telescopes will produce among the first higher fidelity images from a long baseline interferometer, astronomical interferometry is principally conducted using Michelson interferometers. The principal operational interferometric observatories which use this type of instrumentation include VLTI, NPOI, engineers at the European Southern Observatory ESO designed the Very Large Telescope VLT so that it can also be used as an interferometer. Along with the four 8. 2-metre unit telescopes, four mobile 1. 8-metre auxiliary telescopes were included in the overall VLT concept to form the Very Large Telescope Interferometer. The ATs can move between 30 different stations, and at present, the telescopes can form groups of two or three for interferometry, when using interferometry, a complex system of mirrors brings the light from the different telescopes to the astronomical instruments where it is combined and processed. This is technically demanding as the light paths must be equal to within 1/1000 mm over distances of a few hundred metres. For the Unit Telescopes, this gives an equivalent mirror diameter of up to 130 metres, and this is up to 25 times better than the resolution of a single VLT unit telescope
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Type Ia supernova
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A type Ia supernova is a type of supernova that occurs in binary systems in which one of the stars is a white dwarf. The other star can be anything from a giant star to a smaller white dwarf. Physically, carbon–oxygen white dwarfs with a low rate of rotation are limited to below 1.44 solar masses, beyond this, they re-ignite and in some cases trigger a supernova explosion. If a white dwarf accretes mass from a binary companion. If the white dwarf merges with another white dwarf, it will exceed the limit and begin to collapse. This type Ia category of supernovae produces consistent peak luminosity because of the mass of white dwarfs that explode via the accretion mechanism. In May 2015, NASA reported that the Kepler space observatory observed KSN 2011b, details of the pre-nova moments may help scientists better judge the quality of Type Ia supernovae as standard candles, which is an important link in the argument for dark energy. The Type Ia supernova is a sub-category in the Minkowski-Zwicky supernova classification scheme, there are several means by which a supernova of this type can form, but they share a common underlying mechanism. The current view among astronomers who model Type Ia supernova explosions, however, is that limit is never actually attained. At some point in this phase, a deflagration flame front is born. The details of the ignition are still unknown, including the location, oxygen fusion is initiated shortly thereafter, but this fuel is not consumed as completely as carbon. Once fusion has begun, the temperature of the white dwarf starts to rise, a main sequence star supported by thermal pressure would expand and cool which automatically counterbalances an increase in thermal energy. However, degeneracy pressure is independent of temperature, the dwarf is unable to regulate the fusion process in the manner of normal stars. The flame accelerates dramatically, in due to the Rayleigh–Taylor instability. It is still a matter of debate whether this flame transforms into a supersonic detonation from a subsonic deflagration. The star explodes violently and releases a wave in which matter is typically ejected at speeds on the order of 5, 000–20000 km/s. The energy released in the explosion causes an extreme increase in luminosity. The typical visual absolute magnitude of Type Ia supernovae is Mv = −19.3, the theory of this type of supernovae is similar to that of novae, in which a white dwarf accretes matter more slowly and does not approach the Chandrasekhar limit
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White dwarf
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A white dwarf, also called a degenerate dwarf, is a stellar core remnant composed mostly of electron-degenerate matter. A white dwarf is very dense, its mass is comparable to that of the Sun, a white dwarfs faint luminosity comes from the emission of stored thermal energy, no fusion takes place in a white dwarf wherein mass is converted to energy. The nearest known white dwarf is Sirius B, at 8.6 light years, there are currently thought to be eight white dwarfs among the hundred star systems nearest the Sun. The unusual faintness of white dwarfs was first recognized in 1910, the name white dwarf was coined by Willem Luyten in 1922. The universe has not existed long enough to experience a white dwarf releasing all of its energy as it will take many billions of years. If a red giant has insufficient mass to generate the temperatures, around 1 billion K, required to fuse carbon. After such a star sheds its outer layers and forms a planetary nebula, it will leave behind a core, usually, white dwarfs are composed of carbon and oxygen. If the mass of the progenitor is between 8 and 10.5 solar masses, the temperature will be sufficient to fuse carbon but not neon. Stars of very low mass will not be able to fuse helium, hence, the material in a white dwarf no longer undergoes fusion reactions, so the star has no source of energy. As a result, it support itself by the heat generated by fusion against gravitational collapse. A carbon-oxygen white dwarf that approaches this limit, typically by mass transfer from a companion star. A white dwarf is very hot when it forms, but because it has no source of energy, it will gradually radiate its energy and this means that its radiation, which initially has a high color temperature, will lessen and redden with time. Over a very time, a white dwarf will cool. The stars low temperature means it will no longer emit significant heat or light, and it will become a cold black dwarf. Because the length of time it takes for a dwarf to reach this state is calculated to be longer than the current age of the universe. The oldest white dwarfs still radiate at temperatures of a few thousand kelvins, the pair 40 Eridani B/C was discovered by William Herschel on 31 January 1783, p.73 it was again observed by Friedrich Georg Wilhelm Struve in 1825 and by Otto Wilhelm von Struve in 1851. In 1910, Henry Norris Russell, Edward Charles Pickering and Williamina Fleming discovered that, despite being a dim star,40 Eridani B was of spectral type A, or white. In 1939, Russell looked back on the discovery, p.1 I was visiting my friend and generous benefactor and this piece of apparently routine work proved very fruitful—it led to the discovery that all the stars of very faint absolute magnitude were of spectral class M
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Black Eye Galaxy
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The Black Eye Galaxy is a galaxy which was discovered by Edward Pigott in March 1779, and independently by Johann Elert Bode in April of the same year, as well as by Charles Messier in 1780. It has a dark band of absorbing dust in front of the galaxys bright nucleus. The galaxy is called the Sleeping Beauty galaxy. M64 is well known among amateur astronomers because of its appearance in small telescopes and it is a spiral galaxy in the Coma Berenices constellation. The interstellar medium of Messier 64 comprises two counter-rotating disks which are equal in mass. The inner disk contains the prominent dust lanes of the galaxy, the stellar population of the galaxy exhibits no measurable counter-rotation. Possible formation scenarios include a merger with a satellite galaxy in a retrograde orbit
28.
ArXiv
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In many fields of mathematics and physics, almost all scientific papers are self-archived on the arXiv repository. Begun on August 14,1991, arXiv. org passed the half-million article milestone on October 3,2008, by 2014 the submission rate had grown to more than 8,000 per month. The arXiv was made possible by the low-bandwidth TeX file format, around 1990, Joanne Cohn began emailing physics preprints to colleagues as TeX files, but the number of papers being sent soon filled mailboxes to capacity. Additional modes of access were added, FTP in 1991, Gopher in 1992. The term e-print was quickly adopted to describe the articles and its original domain name was xxx. lanl. gov. Due to LANLs lack of interest in the rapidly expanding technology, in 1999 Ginsparg changed institutions to Cornell University and it is now hosted principally by Cornell, with 8 mirrors around the world. Its existence was one of the factors that led to the current movement in scientific publishing known as open access. Mathematicians and scientists regularly upload their papers to arXiv. org for worldwide access, Ginsparg was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship in 2002 for his establishment of arXiv. The annual budget for arXiv is approximately $826,000 for 2013 to 2017, funded jointly by Cornell University Library, annual donations were envisaged to vary in size between $2,300 to $4,000, based on each institution’s usage. As of 14 January 2014,174 institutions have pledged support for the period 2013–2017 on this basis, in September 2011, Cornell University Library took overall administrative and financial responsibility for arXivs operation and development. Ginsparg was quoted in the Chronicle of Higher Education as saying it was supposed to be a three-hour tour, however, Ginsparg remains on the arXiv Scientific Advisory Board and on the arXiv Physics Advisory Committee. The lists of moderators for many sections of the arXiv are publicly available, additionally, an endorsement system was introduced in 2004 as part of an effort to ensure content that is relevant and of interest to current research in the specified disciplines. Under the system, for categories that use it, an author must be endorsed by an established arXiv author before being allowed to submit papers to those categories. Endorsers are not asked to review the paper for errors, new authors from recognized academic institutions generally receive automatic endorsement, which in practice means that they do not need to deal with the endorsement system at all. However, the endorsement system has attracted criticism for allegedly restricting scientific inquiry, perelman appears content to forgo the traditional peer-reviewed journal process, stating, If anybody is interested in my way of solving the problem, its all there – let them go and read about it. The arXiv generally re-classifies these works, e. g. in General mathematics, papers can be submitted in any of several formats, including LaTeX, and PDF printed from a word processor other than TeX or LaTeX. The submission is rejected by the software if generating the final PDF file fails, if any image file is too large. ArXiv now allows one to store and modify an incomplete submission, the time stamp on the article is set when the submission is finalized
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Cambridge University Press
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Cambridge University Press is the publishing business of the University of Cambridge. Granted letters patent by Henry VIII in 1534, it is the worlds oldest publishing house and it also holds letters patent as the Queens Printer. The Presss mission is To further the Universitys mission by disseminating knowledge in the pursuit of education, learning, Cambridge University Press is a department of the University of Cambridge and is both an academic and educational publisher. With a global presence, publishing hubs, and offices in more than 40 countries. Its publishing includes journals, monographs, reference works, textbooks. Cambridge University Press is an enterprise that transfers part of its annual surplus back to the university. Cambridge University Press is both the oldest publishing house in the world and the oldest university press and it originated from Letters Patent granted to the University of Cambridge by Henry VIII in 1534, and has been producing books continuously since the first University Press book was printed. Cambridge is one of the two privileged presses, authors published by Cambridge have included John Milton, William Harvey, Isaac Newton, Bertrand Russell, and Stephen Hawking. In 1591, Thomass successor, John Legate, printed the first Cambridge Bible, the London Stationers objected strenuously, claiming that they had the monopoly on Bible printing. The universitys response was to point out the provision in its charter to print all manner of books. In July 1697 the Duke of Somerset made a loan of £200 to the university towards the house and presse and James Halman, Registrary of the University. It was in Bentleys time, in 1698, that a body of scholars was appointed to be responsible to the university for the Presss affairs. The Press Syndicates publishing committee still meets regularly, and its role still includes the review, John Baskerville became University Printer in the mid-eighteenth century. Baskervilles concern was the production of the finest possible books using his own type-design, a technological breakthrough was badly needed, and it came when Lord Stanhope perfected the making of stereotype plates. This involved making a mould of the surface of a page of type. The Press was the first to use this technique, and in 1805 produced the technically successful, under the stewardship of C. J. Clay, who was University Printer from 1854 to 1882, the Press increased the size and scale of its academic and educational publishing operation. An important factor in this increase was the inauguration of its list of schoolbooks, during Clays administration, the Press also undertook a sizable co-publishing venture with Oxford, the Revised Version of the Bible, which was begun in 1870 and completed in 1885. It was Wright who devised the plan for one of the most distinctive Cambridge contributions to publishing—the Cambridge Histories, the Cambridge Modern History was published between 1902 and 1912
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International Standard Book Number
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The International Standard Book Number is a unique numeric commercial book identifier. An ISBN is assigned to each edition and variation of a book, for example, an e-book, a paperback and a hardcover edition of the same book would each have a different ISBN. The ISBN is 13 digits long if assigned on or after 1 January 2007, the method of assigning an ISBN is nation-based and varies from country to country, often depending on how large the publishing industry is within a country. The initial ISBN configuration of recognition was generated in 1967 based upon the 9-digit Standard Book Numbering created in 1966, the 10-digit ISBN format was developed by the International Organization for Standardization and was published in 1970 as international standard ISO2108. Occasionally, a book may appear without a printed ISBN if it is printed privately or the author does not follow the usual ISBN procedure, however, this can be rectified later. Another identifier, the International Standard Serial Number, identifies periodical publications such as magazines, the ISBN configuration of recognition was generated in 1967 in the United Kingdom by David Whitaker and in 1968 in the US by Emery Koltay. The 10-digit ISBN format was developed by the International Organization for Standardization and was published in 1970 as international standard ISO2108, the United Kingdom continued to use the 9-digit SBN code until 1974. The ISO on-line facility only refers back to 1978, an SBN may be converted to an ISBN by prefixing the digit 0. For example, the edition of Mr. J. G. Reeder Returns, published by Hodder in 1965, has SBN340013818 -340 indicating the publisher,01381 their serial number. This can be converted to ISBN 0-340-01381-8, the check digit does not need to be re-calculated, since 1 January 2007, ISBNs have contained 13 digits, a format that is compatible with Bookland European Article Number EAN-13s. An ISBN is assigned to each edition and variation of a book, for example, an ebook, a paperback, and a hardcover edition of the same book would each have a different ISBN. The ISBN is 13 digits long if assigned on or after 1 January 2007, a 13-digit ISBN can be separated into its parts, and when this is done it is customary to separate the parts with hyphens or spaces. Separating the parts of a 10-digit ISBN is also done with either hyphens or spaces, figuring out how to correctly separate a given ISBN number is complicated, because most of the parts do not use a fixed number of digits. ISBN issuance is country-specific, in that ISBNs are issued by the ISBN registration agency that is responsible for country or territory regardless of the publication language. Some ISBN registration agencies are based in national libraries or within ministries of culture, in other cases, the ISBN registration service is provided by organisations such as bibliographic data providers that are not government funded. In Canada, ISBNs are issued at no cost with the purpose of encouraging Canadian culture. In the United Kingdom, United States, and some countries, where the service is provided by non-government-funded organisations. Australia, ISBNs are issued by the library services agency Thorpe-Bowker
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PubMed Identifier
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PubMed is a free search engine accessing primarily the MEDLINE database of references and abstracts on life sciences and biomedical topics. The United States National Library of Medicine at the National Institutes of Health maintains the database as part of the Entrez system of information retrieval, from 1971 to 1997, MEDLINE online access to the MEDLARS Online computerized database primarily had been through institutional facilities, such as university libraries. PubMed, first released in January 1996, ushered in the era of private, free, home-, the PubMed system was offered free to the public in June 1997, when MEDLINE searches via the Web were demonstrated, in a ceremony, by Vice President Al Gore. Information about the journals indexed in MEDLINE, and available through PubMed, is found in the NLM Catalog. As of 5 January 2017, PubMed has more than 26.8 million records going back to 1966, selectively to the year 1865, and very selectively to 1809, about 500,000 new records are added each year. As of the date,13.1 million of PubMeds records are listed with their abstracts. In 2016, NLM changed the system so that publishers will be able to directly correct typos. Simple searches on PubMed can be carried out by entering key aspects of a subject into PubMeds search window, when a journal article is indexed, numerous article parameters are extracted and stored as structured information. Such parameters are, Article Type, Secondary identifiers, Language, publication type parameter enables many special features. As these clinical girish can generate small sets of robust studies with considerable precision, since July 2005, the MEDLINE article indexing process extracts important identifiers from the article abstract and puts those in a field called Secondary Identifier. The secondary identifier field is to store numbers to various databases of molecular sequence data, gene expression or chemical compounds. For clinical trials, PubMed extracts trial IDs for the two largest trial registries, ClinicalTrials. gov and the International Standard Randomized Controlled Trial Number Register, a reference which is judged particularly relevant can be marked and related articles can be identified. If relevant, several studies can be selected and related articles to all of them can be generated using the Find related data option, the related articles are then listed in order of relatedness. To create these lists of related articles, PubMed compares words from the title and abstract of each citation, as well as the MeSH headings assigned, using a powerful word-weighted algorithm. The related articles function has been judged to be so precise that some researchers suggest it can be used instead of a full search, a strong feature of PubMed is its ability to automatically link to MeSH terms and subheadings. Examples would be, bad breath links to halitosis, heart attack to myocardial infarction, where appropriate, these MeSH terms are automatically expanded, that is, include more specific terms. Terms like nursing are automatically linked to Nursing or Nursing and this important feature makes PubMed searches automatically more sensitive and avoids false-negative hits by compensating for the diversity of medical terminology. The My NCBI area can be accessed from any computer with web-access, an earlier version of My NCBI was called PubMed Cubby
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Messier 88
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Messier 88 is a spiral galaxy about 50 to 60 million light-years away in the constellation Coma Berenices. It was discovered by Charles Messier in 1781, M88 is one of the fifteen Messier objects that belong to the nearby Virgo Cluster of galaxies. It is galaxy number 1401 in the Virgo Cluster Catalogue of 2096 galaxies that are members of the cluster. M88 may be on an elliptical orbit that is carrying it toward the cluster center. It is currently 0. 3–0.48 million parsecs from the center, the motion of M88 through the intergalactic medium of the Virgo cluster is creating ram pressure that is stripping away the outer region of neutral hydrogen. This stripping has already been detected along the western, leading edge of the galaxy and this galaxy is inclined to the line of sight by 64°. It is classified as an Sbc spiral, which lies between the Sb and Sc categories of medium-wound and loosely wound spiral arms, respectively, the arm structure of the spirals is very regular and can be followed down to the galactic core. The maximum rotation velocity of the gas is 241.6 ±4.5 km/s, M88 is also classified as a type 2 Seyfert galaxy, which means it produces narrow spectral line emission from highly ionized gas in the galactic nuclei. In the core there is a central condensation with a 230 parsec diameter. This condensation is being fed by inflow from the spiral arms, the supermassive black hole at the core of this galaxy has 107.9 solar masses, or about 80 million times the mass of the Sun. In 1999, supernova 1999cl was discovered in this galaxy, Messier 98 Spiral Galaxy M88 @ SEDS Messier pages Messier 88 on WikiSky, DSS2, SDSS, GALEX, IRAS, Hydrogen α, X-Ray, Astrophoto, Sky Map, Articles and images
, Bibcode:2001ApJ...546..681T, doi:10.1086/318301.
