Actually, Rho Cas is in the process of doing just that. It may be just about as bright as a star can get without blowing itself apart. Rho Cas, which is to the right of Cassiopeia's W, is far bigger and more massive than the Sun and at least a half-million times brighter. It is about 10,000 light-years away, making it one of the most distant stars that is visible to the unaided eye. For a few days or weeks, it will outshine everything in the night sky except the Moon.Īnother of the constellation's stars, Rho Cassiopeia, is also destined to explode as a supernova. Eventually, the star will no longer be able to produce energy in its core, causing the core to collapse and its outer layers to explode as a supernova. That energy works its way to the surface and shines into space as visible light, ultraviolet, and other forms of electromagnetic energy. Such a monster produces a lot of energy through the nuclear reactions in its core. That's because Gamma Cas is about 15 times as massive as the Sun and hundreds of times wider. If you add up all of its energy - not just the light that is visible to the eye - it shines about 40,000 times brighter than the Sun. Gamma Cassiopeia is the star at the middle of the W. Cassiopeia looks like a flattened "W" against the frothy background of our home galaxy, the Milky Way. In the Indian constellation system, Cassiopeia is known as ಕುಂತಿ (Kunti), a character from the Mahabharata.The best time to see her is in late fall, when she stands high in the northeastern sky during the evening hours. Poseidon and his brother Zeus decreed that Casseopia be placed in the sky as a constellation, and as punishment for being so conceited about her looks, she would suffer the humiliating position of being upside down in the sky during the fall of the year when her constellation is best seen. However, she was saved by Perseus, and Cetus was turned to stone. The people took Andromeda and chained her to a rock which projected out into the sea to be sacrificed to Cetus. He replied that if the beautiful Andromeda, Casseopia’s only daughter, were to be sacrificed to Cetus the destruction would stop. The people asked Poseidon if there were any other way to stop the destruction. Poseidon replied that if Casseopia would admit that his sea nymphs were indeed more beautiful than she, he would stop the monster. In an effort to stop this tremendous destruction, the people when to Poseidon and asked what could be done to stop this monster. This created great fear among the people of Casseopia’s country. In his anger, he created a great sea monster, Cetus (also described as a great fish or whale), to ravage the seas, sinking ships, killing the sailors, and destroying towns and villages along the seacoast. Poseidon, the brother of Zeus and the god of the sea, took great offense at this statement, for he created the most beautiful beings ever in the form of his sea nymphs. Eventually, herboasting proclaimed that her beauty even exceeded that of the gods. As time went by, she began to say that she was the most beautiful woman in the world. She boasted that she was the most beautiful woman in the kingdom. In classical mythology, Cassiopeia was queen of Ethiopia, wife of Cepheus and mother of Andromeda.Īccording to the Greeks, Queen Casseopia, was very beautiful. It contains more than twenty open clusters exceeding tenth magnitude, and a similar number of fifth magnitude stars. The plane of the Milky Way runs through the middle of the ‘W’ asterism, making it a particularly rich area of the sky to view through binoculars. Cassiopeia was one of the 48 constellations listed by the 2nd-century Greek astronomer Ptolemy It is highest in the sky at midnight in the months around September. Cassiopeia is one of the most recognizable of the constellations, a distinctive ‘W’ shape in the far northern sky.
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