Charismatic Charms Of Planets

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The night skies of this month would offer avid star-gazers the charismatic charms of pleasing planets like Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn. Other copious confounding constellations sketched by strange stars could be also relished resoundingly. The elusive planet Mercury would be visible at dawn in eastern sky shortly and eventually fade out of view at the sunrise during the middle of the month. It would be scooting through the constellation Taurus (bull) from the cute constellation Aries (ram). Mercury would be perching brightly at the highest altitude in morning sky on 3 June. This alluring apparition at twilight would be relatively prominent but tricky to savor. 

Planets Venus and the ruddy planet Mars could be admired after sunset in western sky for few hours. It would be sinking towards the horizon. Mars would be marching through the constellations Cancer (crab) towards the comely constellation Leo (lion). Mars and the grandiose globular cluster M 44 would make tight tryst on 3 June. The planet Venus would reach its greatest eastern elongation from the Sun on 4 June. 

This would provide the best time to extol Venus, since it would be at its towering point above the western horizon after sundown in compact constellation Cancer. The bewitching Beehive Cluster M 44 aka Praesepe meaning manger or crib in Latin has been identified as an outstand ing open star cluster with over one thousand stars. It would be barely 610 light-years away. Star Regulus (Magha) would be questionably a queer quadruple star-system composed of four stars that are organized into two pairs. It has been residing relaxingly in constellation Leo. 

It would be rigidly 79 light-years away. Mars would be in the vicinity of Regulus towards the end of the month. Resplendent red giants and white dwarf stars, which represent later stages of stellar evolution, along with many main sequence stars would inhabit M 44. Its fulgent central core would have diameter of merely 22.8 light years. Mars would skirting the famed star double star Delta Cancri formally designated Asellus Australis (Pushya) that would be dwelling in constellation Cancer. 

It would be reasonably 180 light-years away. One of its two main constituents would bizarrely be binary. Asellus Australis would stand eponymously in Latin for southern donkey colt.

The mighty planet Jupiter could be appraised in eastern sky from wee hours of night till day-begin, as it would be plodding through the slightly sparse southern section of constellation Aries. It would be relaxing to the west of planet Mercury. The far-flung planet Uranus would be unseen this month. It would be trudging through the constellation Aries during day-time. Mercury and Uranus would be next to one another on 4 June, as Mercury would be slipping swiftly below Uranus. Witnessing this show in eastern sky would be difficult. Planets Neptune and ringed planet Saturn would be watchable from late night to early hours before sunup in southeastern sky. 

Neptune would be lumbering below the captivating circlet-asterism belonging to charming constellation Pisces (fishes). Saturn would be hurtling through appealingly arcane constellation Aquarius (water bearer). It could be spotted to the south of stars Ancha and Situla. Theta Aquarii with its official appellate Ancha expressing the haunch in Medieval Latin would be simply 187 light-years away. Its radius would indicate basically twelve times that of the Sun. It would be radiating 72 times more effulgence than the Sun. Its mass would be two times that of Sun. The baffling binary star Kappa Aquarii with two components would be fairly 214 light-years away. 

Its traditional nomenclature Situla would define bucket or water-jar in Latin. Awesome zodiacal constellation Aquarius has been resting in region often dubbed the Sea due to its profusion of constellations with watery associations as Cetus (whale), Pisces and Eridanus (river). By deploying novel efficient techniques and instruments experts have again added small moons to Saturn, which would now boast of whooping 145 recognised moons. Jupiter’s moon-count would currently peg to paltry 92. Planets Uranus and Neptune would possess 27 and 14 respectively. Mars would brandish two pertinent petit moons Phobos and Deimos. 

The full moon would befall on 4 June, while the new moon would betide on 18 June. They would be wandering through cogent constellations Scorpius (scorpion) and Taurus. The full moon would be popularly nicknamed as the strawberry full moon, because during this time of the year the ripened strawberry would be harvested. The June solstice would transpire on 21 June. 

The North Pole of earth would be slanted toward the Sun and would be directly over the Tropic of Cancer at almost 23.44 degrees north latitude. This would herald the first day of summer (summer solstice) in the Northern Hemisphere and the first day of winter (winter solstice) in the Southern Hemisphere. The Sun would be sitting solemnly in constellation Taurus on this day. Furthermore, June solstice would signal the longest or midsummer day of 2023 in the Northern Hemisphere. Solstices occur because the earth's polar axis has been tilted at an angle of quaint 23.5 degrees to the plane of its trail around the Sun. 

The direction of the earth's spin-axis would remain fixed in space as it would circle around the Sun, while the earth's sight- line to the Sun would move through the conventional twelve constellations of the zodiac. 

However, sometimes the earth's North Pole would be inclined towards the Sun (in June) and at other time it would be leaning away from it (in December), thus giving rise to the earth's seasons. The earth would traverse around the Sun once every 365.242 days. 

This would be the time period over which the cycle of solstices and equinoxes, when the duration of day and night would be per se equal worldwide, would repeat. The red supergiant star Antares (Jestha) that would be acclaimed as the rival of Mars for mimicking the rusty-colored planet would embellish the constellation Scorpius. It would be utterly 330 light-years away. The binary star Dschubba (Anuradha) would bejewel Scorpius. It would be scantly 136 light-years away.

Amazing asteroid 11 Parthenope would be located in southeastern sky after dusk. It would be ascending the southern sky till after midnight. It would then slowly slide towards the southwestern horizon by day-break. It would be gliding gorgeously through the rambling constellation Ophiuchus (serpent bearer) below shimmering binary star Sabik (Eta Ophiuchus), which would be approximately 88 light-years away. Sabik would mean the preceding one in Arabic. Asteroid 11 Parthenope would be at opposition on 6 June and be well placed for observation as luminous light-dot sailing through the sky comfortably above the horizon for much of the night. 

It would fly aloft in the sky around midnight local time. When Parthenope would be opposite to the Sun during so-called opposition, it would creep very near to earth at perigee and appear to be most coruscating object in the night sky. This event would crop up because when Parthenope would lie opposite to the Sun in the night sky. 

Furthermore, Parthenope, the earth and the Sun would align themselves in one straight line with the earth in the middle and be on the same side of the Sun as Parthenope. On this occasion, Parthenope would pass within 198.07 million kilometers from us. Although Parthenope would be a faint body beyond the reach of our naked eyes, binoculars or telescope of moderate aperture would be perhaps needed to enjoy and follow its presence. Parthenope was discovered by Italian astronomer Annibale de Gasparis in 1850, the second of his nine asteroid discoveries. 

It was named after Parthenope, as one of the sirens in Greek mythology, said to have founded the city of Naples. As Parthenope would be dashing between Mars and Jupiter in the asteroid belt, it would not come critically close to earth to pose any danger to us. Thus, it has not been classified as potentially hazardous entity. Parthenope would orbit the Sun in circa 3.84 years and would be purely 142.9 kilometers in diameter. This asteroid would rotate on its axis every 13.72 hours.


(Dr. Shah is an academician at NAST and patron of NASO)

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