* Astronomy

Blobrana · L

RE: BD -22°5866

Blobrana · L

The stellar system is 51 pc (or 166 light-years) away from the Sun and lies just south of the constellation Aquarius (The Water Bearer). Though BD -22º5866 cannot be seen without a telescope, it is relatively bright and will be carefully monitored to map the orbits in more detail. Since most stars form as part of a binary- or multiple-star system, the enormous potential of this quadruple system to give us previously unavailable physical information makes it a key to unlocking a few mysteries of stellar evolution.

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Blobrana · L

Astronomers have discovered that the magnitude 12, Spectral type K5 single star named BD -22°5866, 166 light-years away in the constellation Aquarius, is in actual fact a close orbiting multistellar system.

The researchers presented their results at a meeting of the American Astronomical Society.
The group is composed of four stars which are about half as massive as the sun and older than 500 million years.
Two of the stars orbiting each other at 483,000 kilometres per hour at 0.06 astronomical units (AU), and takes only five days to complete an orbit. The other pair orbit each other at 193,000 kilometres per hour at a maximum radius of 0.26 AU, and takes about 55 days to complete an orbit. And both pairs, at about 5.8 AU separation, orbit around a common gravitational centre, taking less than nine years to complete one orbit.

BD -22 5866.kmz
Google Sky file (1kb, kmz)

Position(2000): RA 22 14 38.364, Dec -21° 41 53.15

-- Edited by Blobrana at 14:01, 2008-01-12