Reticulum
No
- Pendulum
- Small water snake
- Swordfish
The power (Latin reticulum, small network ) is a constellation of the southern sky.
Description
The net is a small but distinctive constellation north of the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC ). Four stars form a rhombus.
History
The constellation was originally called " lozenge " and was introduced in 1624 by the Silesian cartographer Jacob Bartsch.
1752 called it the French astronomer Nicolas Louis de Lacaille around in " reticulum rhomboidalis " ( rhombic network). It does not represent a network in the traditional sense, but an astronomical measuring instrument: A glass plate with a grid pattern of engraved lines, which could be introduced before an eyepiece (eg a reticle ). It is thus one of the constellations that Lacaille named after technical equipment.
Celestial objects
Stars
β Reticuli is a 100 light-years distant, orange shining star of spectral type K0 IV
Double stars
α Reticuli is a 163 light-years distant binary star system. The glowing yellow main star has 20 times the diameter and 100 times the luminosity of our Sun. It has a faint companion of the 12th magnitude in 2450 AU, which orbits at 60,000 years.
ζ Reticuli is a binary star system 39 light years away. Due to the large angular distance of 310 " arc seconds both stars are visible to the naked eye.