Episode Details

Hosted by Chris Beckett & Shane Ludtke, two amateur astronomers in Saskatchewan. actualastronomy@gmail.com

This month in episode 516 we talk about the many things to see in the night sky including, carbon stars, double stars, 24P Schaumasse is a Comet that just cracks 8th magnitude making it visible in binoculars. We also detail how people can explore Jupiter through a telescope followed by many NGC and Messier Objects you can see in the winter sky.

Jan 1 - Struve 627 in Orion Colorful Double Star

• Primary Star (A component): Yellow, golden-yellow, pale orange, or sometimes just white.
• Companion Star (B component): Bluish, blue-green, lilac, or pale green.

Jan 2 - 40 Harmonia at opposition

a large S-type (silicate) asteroid located in the inner region of the Main Asteroid Belt between Mars and Jupiter.

• Discovery: It was discovered on March 31, 1856, by German-French astronomer Hermann Goldschmidt.
• Naming: It is named after Harmonia, the Greek goddess of harmony and peace, to mark the end of the Crimean War.
• Size: It has a mean diameter of approximately 111.3 kilometers (69.1 miles), making it larger than 99% of all known asteroids.
• Orbit: Harmonia orbits the Sun every 3.42 years (approx. 1,250 days) with a relatively low eccentricity of 0.046, meaning its path is nearly circular.
• Rotation: It completes one full rotation on its axis every 8.91 hours

Jan 3 - Full Moon

- Quadrantid Meteors ZHR = 120 in Evening for NA observers

- Moon interferes

They are named after Quadrans Muralis, a 19th-century constellation that is no longer officially recognized. Constellation Origin: Lalande created the constellation to honor the mural quadrant, a large wall-mounted scientific instrument he and his nephew used at the observatory of l'École Militaire in Paris to measure star positions.

• Location: It was situated in the northern sky between the modern constellations of Boötes, Draco, and Hercules, near the "handle" of the Big Dipper (Ursa Major).
• Decline: In 1922, the International Astronomical Union (IAU) omitted Quadrans Muralis when it formalized the official list of 88 modern constellations, reassigning its stars to neighboring constellations
• Jan 5 - Sig Orionis colorful double star
• Sigma Orionis AB: This is the brightest component of the system and is a very close binary that appears as one star in most amateur telescopes. It is actually a triple system itself (Aa, Ab, and B).
• The primary stars (Aa and Ab) are highly massive, very hot blue stars that orbit each other every 143 days.
• The outer component (B) orbits the inner pair every 157 years.
• Sigma Orionis C, D, and E: These are additional companion stars that are farther from the AB pair and can be observed with small-to-medium sized telescopes, making the system appear as a beautiful quartet or quintuple system.
• Component D is magnitude 6.62 and is about 13 arcseconds from the AB pair.
• Component E is magnitude 6.66 and is approximately 41 arcseconds away. This star is notable as the prototype of the rare "helium-rich" stars.

Jan 6 - Regulus 0.5-degrees South of Moon

Jan 8 - 24P Schaumasse Comet just cracks 8th magnitude, at Mag. 7.9 it is firmly a Bino comet

Jan 10 - Last Quarter

- Jupiter at Opposition - mag. -2.5, 46 arc seconds in Gemini

• GRS looks nice and Orange/Red
• NEB and SEB are prominent
• How to best observe? Powers/Filters/Bino viewers
• Book rec. Jupiter and How to Observe It by John McAnally

- NGC 1851 well placed but I'd need to dig a trench to see it

- Carbon Star RV Monoceros

Jan 11 -Follow Arcturus into daylight this week

- M79, M42, M43, M78 well placed