{"id":15568,"date":"2022-07-25T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-07-24T22:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/?p=15568&preview=true&preview_id=15568"},"modified":"2022-07-27T12:13:47","modified_gmt":"2022-07-27T10:13:47","slug":"astronomy-for-beginners-6","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/2022\/07\/25\/astronomy-for-beginners-6\/","title":{"rendered":"Astronomy for beginners"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
<\/div>
\n

ASTRONOMY FOR BEGINNERS<\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
Locate Delphinus using Altair as a guide. Altair appears halfway up the sky, due south, at 1:30am mid-July, 00:30am 1 August and 11:30pm mid-August (all times BST)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

DELPHINUS THE DOLPHIN<\/span><\/h4>\n\n\n\n
WHEN: LATE JULY AND AUGUST<\/span><\/h5>\n\n\n\n

There are many creatures depicted in the night sky. Some, such as Scorpius the Scorpion or Cygnus the Swan, do, with a bit of imagination, look like the thing they\u2019re supposed to represent. Others, such as Delphinus the Dolphin, require more work. Delphinus is a small constellation of summer, located to the left (east) and slightly north of the summer star Altair, the brightest in the constellation of Aquila the Eagle. Altair is easily identified thanks to the two dimmer, but still bright, stars that sit either side of it; Tarazed and Alshain.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The best way to describe how Delphinus appears to the naked eye, is as a small diamond pattern with a tail. The diamond pattern is also an asterism (an unofficial pattern) known as Job\u2019s Coffin. The constellation may not look too much like a dolphin at first, but that may be because you\u2019re imagining it wrong. It\u2019s supposed to represent the nose and neck of a bottle-nosed dolphin, its head poking out of the sea.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Delphinus is compact, and even though its stars aren\u2019t particularly bright, it is distinctive. The two stars on the western (right) side of the diamond have the unusual names Sualocin and Rotanev. These first appeared on the Palermo Star Catalogue <\/em>of 1814, courtesy of the Italian astronomer Niccol\u00f2 Cacciatore. It took 45 years before the British astronomer Reverend Thomas Webb worked out what Cacciatore had done to create the star names. He\u2019d Latinised the English version of his name to arrive at Nicolaus Venator and simply reversed the letters to generate the star names as a practical joke which has stuck. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The dolphin\u2019s nose is marked by Gamma Delphini, a binary star which splits into a golden-orange primary and yellow secondary, when viewed through the eyepiece of a telescope. PL <\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div><\/section>\n\n

ILLUSTRATION: PETE LAWRENCE<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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