Ay 1: The Evolving Universe
Spring 2025
Prof. Dimitri Mawet
Lecture 2: starting the exploration
Learning
outcomes
• Celestial Coordinate Systems
• How do we define the
positions of objects on the
sky?
• Sidereal time
• Distances and Scales
• How do we measure the
distance of celestial objects?
Celestial Coordinate Systems
How do we define the positions of objects on the sky?
The Earth’s axis is tilted at 23.5 degrees to the Ecliptic
The equatorial
coordinate system
• The coordinates are:
• Right Ascension (RA, or )
• Declination (Dec, or )
• RA = 0 defined by the Solar position at the
Vernal (March) Equinox
• The RA goes positive eastward along the
celestial equator
• The Dec goes positive towards the North
celestial pole
The Annual
Solar Path
Questions
• What is the length of day and
night at the equinoxes?
• What happens at the poles?
The Equatorial Coordinate
System units
• Right Ascension (RA, or )
- measured in hours, minutes and seconds
• Declination (Dec, or )
- measured in degrees, arcminutes and
arcseconds
• RA minutes/seconds are in units of time-angle,
and much coarser (factor 15) than
arcminutes/arcseconds
Question
• Where does the factor
15 come from?
Arcminutes and
arcseconds
• An arcsecond – a dime
coin (18 mm) at 4 km
• A milliarcsecond (1/1000
of an arcsecond) - a dime
atop the Eiffel Tower as
seen from New York.
Axial precession
• The Earth’s rotation axis precesses with a
period of ~ 26,000 yrs, caused by the tidal
attraction of the Moon and Sun on the Earth’s
equatorial bulge
• There is also nutation (wobbling of the Earth’s
rotation axis), with a period of ~ 19 yrs
• Coordinates are specified for a given equinox
(e.g., B1950, J2000) and sometimes epoch
• Relationship to Milankovitch cycles
Milankovitch cycles
• The Milankovitch cycles include:
• The shape of Earth’s orbit, known
as eccentricity;
• The angle Earth’s axis is tilted with
respect to Earth’s orbital plane, known
as obliquity; and
• The direction Earth’s axis of rotation is
pointed, known as precession.
The Alt-Az
Coordinate System
• It is location-dependent
• Most modern large telescopes use Alt-
Az mounts
Question
• The first telescopes/refractors were on equatorial
mounts where one of the mount axes was aligned
with the Earth spin axis.
• Why did it take the advent of modern telescopes to
consider alt-az mounts?
Ecliptic plane
Ecliptic (red) and Galactic Plane (Orange)
Definition: Based on Earth's rotation relative to the stars.
One sidereal day: The time it takes for Earth to complete one
full rotation (360°) relative to the distant stars — about 23
Sidereal hours, 56 minutes, and 4 seconds.
Why it's shorter: Because Earth is orbiting the Sun as it
rotates, it must turn slightly more than 360° for the Sun to
Time appear in the same spot in the sky (see synodic time below).
Use: Sidereal time is primarily used in astronomy to predict
the positions of stars and other celestial objects.
Definition: Based on Earth's rotation relative to the
Sun — this is what we experience as a solar day.
Synodic One synodic (solar) day: About 24 hours – the time
from one solar noon (when the Sun is highest in the
sky) to the next.
Time Why it's longer: After one full 360° rotation (sidereal
day), the Earth must rotate about 1° more (about 4
minutes) for the Sun to appear at the same position in
the sky due to Earth's orbital motion.
Synodic Time (relative to the Sun) vs Sidereal Time (relative to the Stars)
• As the Earth goes around the Sun, it makes an extra
turn wrt the stars. Thus:
• Synodic/tropical year = 365.25 (solar) days
• Sidereal year = 366.25 sidereal days = 365.25
solar days
• Universal time, UT = relative to the Sun, at Greenwich
• Local Sidereal Time (LST) = relative to the celestial
sphere
• = RA now crossing the local meridian
Why do we care about LST?
How do we measure the distance of
celestial objects?
P.S. Astronomers use cgs
(centimeter–gram–second) system
of units
Distances and
Scales
1,270,000,000 cm
(1.27 x 109 cm)
44,700,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 cm (4.4 x 10 28 cm)
The astronomical unit (au)
Average Sun-Earth distance
1 au = 1.496 x 1013 cm ~ 1.5 x 1013 cm
1 au to scale
Solar system planet characteristics
Right orbital scale
Minor bodies
Oort cloud: the reservoir of comets
Astronomers Parsec: the distance from which 1 au
don’t use subtends an angle of 1 arcsec
1 arcsec = 1 au / 1 pc
light-years but
parsec (pc) to 1 pc = 3.086 1018 cm ~ 3 1018 cm
1 pc = 3.26 ly ~ 3 ly
measure most 1 pc = 206,264.8 au ~ 2105 au
distances Distances are necessary in order to convert
beyond the apparent, measured quantities into absolute,
physical ones (e.g., luminosity, size, mass…)
solar system
Question
A gas giant exoplanet orbits its host star at 5 au.
The system is at a distance of 15 pc from the Solar system.
What is the projected angular separation in arcsecond (``)?
How does this compare to the size of the full moon (30’)?
Measuring distances
with Stellar parallax
Question
What is the distance to Alpha Centauri in ly?
Look for the parallax measurement from Simbad web service (Hipparcos mission)
Stellar
distances
Distance to the Centauri triple
system ~1.3pc
Stars visible
to the naked
eye
Up to a kilo-pc (1000 pc)
Globular clusters: a few kpc
Distances in
the Milky
Way Galaxy
(diameter
~ 31 - 55 kpc)
Question
What is the light travel time from
the Sgr A* supermassive black hole
at the Galactic center, which is at
~8kpc?
Magellanic Clouds ~ 50 kpc Virgo cluster ~ 16 Mpc
Galactic Neighborhood
Andromeda galaxy (M31) ~ 700 kpc
Deep Universe: Gpc-scale
1838: Bessel measured = 0.316 arcsec for
star 61 Cyg (modern value = 0.29 arcsec)
How Far Can We
Measure
Parallaxes?
• Nearest stars are > 1 pc
away
• Ground-based telescopes
resolution of ~1 arcsec
• Measuring parallaxes is
hard!
Astrometric space
missions
• Hipparcos satellite: measured
~105 bright stars with errors also
of ~0.001 arcsec
• GAIA satellite: measured positions
of ~109 stars with an accuracy of
~10 micro-arcsecs - this is a
reasonable fraction of all the stars
in the Milky Way!
