New Distance to the Orion Nebula, Part Two

Early this year, an astronomer in England reported he had used the spins of
stars to determine that the Orion Nebula is much closer to Earth than had
been thought. Now astronomers in California have confirmed this result by
measuring the parallax to a young star in this famous stellar nursery.

Both studies find that the Orion Nebula is about 1,300 light-years from
Earth--over 200 light-years closer than previously thought.

For the full story, including a full-color image of the Orion Nebula, please
see http://KenCroswell.com/OrionNebulaDistance2.html .

Magnificent Universe wrote:
Both studies find that the Orion Nebula is about 1,300 light-years from
Earth--over 200 light-years closer than previously thought.

At such a distance 200 ly is pretty much within the observational error.
Regardless, I sure wouldn't call a little more than 10% "much closer"
unless I was into writing hyperbolic press releases. I for one will
never understand why some feel astronomy needs all that hyperbole. I
mean, isn't the reality of it all exciting enough?

--
Greg Crinklaw
Astronomical Software Developer
Cloudcroft, New Mexico, USA (33N, 106W, 2700m)

SkyTools: http://www.skyhound.com/cs.html
Observing: http://www.skyhound.com/sh/skyhound.html
Comets: http://www.skyhound.com/sh/comets.html

To reply take out your eye

"GC" == Greg Crinklaw writes:

GC Magnificent Universe wrote:
Both studies find that the Orion Nebula is about 1,300 light-years
from Earth--over 200 light-years closer than previously thought.

GC At such a distance 200 ly is pretty much within the observational
GC error. Regardless, I sure wouldn't call a little more than 10%
GC "much closer" unless I was into writing hyperbolic press releases.
GC I for one will never understand why some feel astronomy needs all
GC that hyperbole. I mean, isn't the reality of it all exciting
GC enough?

I believe that one of the papers being described is Sandstrom et
al. (astro-ph/0706.2351). From the abstract:

Based on the parallax, we measure a distance of 389 +24/-21 parsecs
to the source. Our measurement places the Orion Nebula Cluster
considerably closer than the canonical distance of 480 +/- 80
parsecs determined by Genzel et al. (1981).

So the estimated observational error on the new parallax distance is
about 70 light years.

--
Lt. Lazio, HTML police | e-mail:
No means no, stop rape. | http://patriot.net/%7Ejlazio/
sci.astro FAQ at http://sciastro.astronomy.net/sci.astro.html

Joseph Lazio wrote:
"GC" == Greg Crinklaw writes:

GC Magnificent Universe wrote:
Both studies find that the Orion Nebula is about 1,300 light-years
from Earth--over 200 light-years closer than previously thought.

GC At such a distance 200 ly is pretty much within the observational
GC error. Regardless, I sure wouldn't call a little more than 10%
GC "much closer" unless I was into writing hyperbolic press releases.
GC I for one will never understand why some feel astronomy needs all
GC that hyperbole. I mean, isn't the reality of it all exciting
GC enough?

I believe that one of the papers being described is Sandstrom et
al. (astro-ph/0706.2351). From the abstract:

Based on the parallax, we measure a distance of 389 +24/-21 parsecs
to the source. Our measurement places the Orion Nebula Cluster
considerably closer than the canonical distance of 480 +/- 80
parsecs determined by Genzel et al. (1981).

And did you catch the part where 480 - 389 is 91? ;-)

Greg Crinklaw wrote:

Magnificent Universe wrote:
Both studies find that the Orion Nebula is about 1,300 light-years from
Earth--over 200 light-years closer than previously thought.

At such a distance 200 ly is pretty much within the observational error.
Regardless, I sure wouldn't call a little more than 10% "much closer"
unless I was into writing hyperbolic press releases. I for one will
never understand why some feel astronomy needs all that hyperbole. I
mean, isn't the reality of it all exciting enough?

--
Greg Crinklaw


Not of you are politicians and realtors looking to put up roadsigns
and tax ans steal!

Astronomical Software Developer
Cloudcroft, New Mexico, USA (33N, 106W, 2700m)

SkyTools: http://www.skyhound.com/cs.html
Observing: http://www.skyhound.com/sh/skyhound.html
Comets: http://www.skyhound.com/sh/comets.html

To reply take out your eye

Naru wrote:
Not of you are politicians and realtors looking to put up roadsigns
and tax ans steal!

Been hitting the bottle again, have yeah?

"Greg Crinklaw" wrote in message
...
: Naru wrote:
: Not of you are politicians and realtors looking to put up roadsigns
: and tax ans steal!
:
: Been hitting the bottle again, have yeah?

That or the crack pipe, Greg.
Does anyone have an accurate radial velocity or parallax distance
for beta Persei I can compute with?

Androcles wrote:
Does anyone have an accurate radial velocity or parallax distance
for beta Persei I can compute with?

http://simbad.u-strasbg.fr/simbad/sim-fid

--
Greg Crinklaw
Astronomical Software Developer
Cloudcroft, New Mexico, USA (33N, 106W, 2700m)

SkyTools: http://www.skyhound.com/cs.html
Observing: http://www.skyhound.com/sh/skyhound.html
Comets: http://www.skyhound.com/sh/comets.html

To reply take out your eye

"Greg Crinklaw" wrote in message
...
: Androcles wrote:
: Does anyone have an accurate radial velocity or parallax distance
: for beta Persei I can compute with?
:
: http://simbad.u-strasbg.fr/simbad/sim-fid


Thanks for the data overload.

Does anyone have an accurate radial velocity or parallax distance
for beta Persei I can compute with?

On Wed, 20 Jun 2007 20:07:10 GMT, "Androcles"
wrote:

Thanks for the data overload.

Does anyone have an accurate radial velocity or parallax distance
for beta Persei I can compute with?

I guess you never took to heart the difference between giving a man a
fish and teaching him to fish g.

There shouldn't be much data overload. Go to the specified link,
http://simbad.u-strasbg.fr/simbad/sim-fid , and enter "beta persei" in
the "Identifier" box. The page that comes up has exactly what you asked
for listed under "Basic data". The radial velocity is 4.0±0.9 km/s (from
the General Catalog of Stellar Radial Velocities). The parallax is
54.14±0.90 mas (from Hipparcos).

_________________________________________________

Chris L Peterson
Cloudbait Observatory
http://www.cloudbait.com