Mimosa (star)
Mimosa is the second brightest object in the southern constellation of Crux after Acrux, and the 21st brightest star in the night sky. It has the Bayer designation β Crucis, which is Beta Crucis in Latin. Its name when shortened is Beta Cru or β Cru. Mimosa is part of the prominent asterism called the Southern Cross. It is a binary star or a possible triple star system. It is also one of the closest stars with a infrared bow shock.
Based on parallax measurements, Mimosa is 277 light years from Earth. In 1957, German astronomor Wulff-Dieter Heintz discovered that it is a spectroscopic binary with components that are too close together to resolve with a telescope.[1] The pair orbit each other every five years with a guessed separation that changes from 5.4 to 12.0 AU.[2] The age of the system is only 8 to 11 million years.[3]
References change
- ↑ Heintz, W. D. (1957-10-01). "The radial velocity variation of beta Crucis". The Observatory. 77: 200. Bibcode:1957Obs....77..200H. ISSN 0029-7704.
- ↑ Aerts, C.; De Cat, P.; Cuypers, J.; Becker, S. R.; Mathias, P.; De Mey, K.; Gillet, D.; Waelkens, C. (1998-01-01). "Evidence for binarity and multiperiodicity in the beta Cephei star beta Crucis". Astronomy and Astrophysics. 329: 137–146. Bibcode:1998A&A...329..137A. ISSN 0004-6361.
- ↑ Cohen, David H.; Kuhn, Michael A.; Gagné, Marc; Jensen, Eric L. N.; Miller, Nathan A. (June 2008). "Chandra spectroscopy of the hot star beta Crucis and the discovery of a pre-main-sequence companion". Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. 386 (4): 1855–1871. arXiv:0802.4084. doi:10.1111/j.1365-2966.2008.13176.x. ISSN 0035-8711. S2CID 2924933.