Altair
Altair is a star in the Aquila constellation.
It may also refer to:
- Altair in fiction
- A system with numerous planets featured in the Star Trek series.
- A solar system in the space simulation computer game Descent: FreeSpace — The Great War
- Altair IV is a fictional planet in the film Forbidden Planet
- The Third Planet from Altair, a book in the Choose Your Own Adventure series
- Altair III, a planet in the play Doctor Who - The Ultimate Adventure
- A planet in the space computer game Frontier: Elite II
- Altair (Stargate) a fictional planet in the Stargate SG-1 television series.
- Characters in popular culture
- Altair is one of the main characters in the game Bomberman 64.
- Altair of Coloni is a minor character in the collectible card game Magic: The Gathering.
- Lachette Altair is a character in Sakura Wars.
- Altaïr, the main character in the video games Assassin's Creed and Assassin's Creed: Altaïr's Chronicles.
- A bird like enemy in the game Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow
- Altair is a form taken by Kamen Rider Zeronos in the Japanese TV show Kamen Rider Den-O.
- Altair is a major antagonist in the animated Japanese TV Show Gear Fighter Dendoh.
- Other popular culture
- Altair is one of the four chariot horses driven to victory by Judah Ben-Hur in the Ben-Hur novel and films.
- Altair is the first town visited and the home of the rebels in the video game Final Fantasy 2.
- Altair is Balthier 's starting weapon in Final Fantasy XII
- D-Sword Altair is a katana appearing in the Japanese TV show Dekaranger.
- Geographical locations
- Altair, São Paulo, a city in Brazil
- Altair, Texas
- Al-Tair Island, Arabic: جزيرة جبل الطير, a volcanic island in the Red Sea
- Vessels
- The Altair spacecraft, the planned lander spacecraft component of NASA's Project Constellation
- Lockheed Altair, an aircraft
- USS Altair was the name of a number of ships of the United States Navy
- USNS Altair, a non-combat United States Naval ship
- The Altair Voyager, a Chevron oil tanker originally named for Condoleezza Rice
- A schooner designed by William Fife
- F/V Altair - King crab vessel lost in the Bering Sea, Valentines Day 1983, along with sister-ship F/V Americus, with a loss of 14 men (7 on each vessel). Homeported in Anacortes, WA.
- Technology
- An amplifier manufactured by Krell Industries
- MITS Altair 8800, one of the first hobbyist/home/personal microcomputers; it was sold as electronic kits through Popular Electronics magazine. See also Altair BASIC, Altair bus
- MITS Altair 680, based on the Motorola 6800 microprocessor.
- X-248 Altair, a rocket engine manufactured by Allegany Ballistics Lab, used in the Delta rocket, Vanguard rocket and Scout rocket
- A long range radar antenna at the Ronald Reagan Ballistic Missile Defense Test Site on the Kwajalein atoll
- Altair (satellite), a series of 5 geosynchronous Russian relay satellites
- Altair (spacecraft), a manned Lunar Lander currently under development.
- Others
- Altair Engineering (shortly Altair), distributed computing consulting and development company
- Altair Semiconductor, a fabless semiconductor company that is developing mobile WiMAX silicon solutions optimized for handsets devices.
- Altair Aviation / Altair Airlines, a defunct aviation company
- Operation ALTAIR is the Canadian Forces maritime contribution to the U.S.-led coalition anti-terrorist campaign known as Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF)
- A track from the album Tales from the Twilight World
- Altair Publishing Australia, specialising in science fiction and fantasy based fiction; and Altair, a magazine published by them
- Altair Publishing, a British academic publisher
Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia; from the article "Altair (disambiguation)". Image Credit.
Extended Definition: Altair
Altair
 Altair. | |
| Observation data Epoch J2000 | |
|---|---|
| Constellation (pronunciation) |
Aquila |
| Right ascension | 19h 50m 47.0s |
| Declination | +08° 52' 06" |
| Apparent magnitude (V) | 0.77 |
| Characteristics | |
| Spectral type | A7 IV-V |
| U-B color index | 0.08 |
| B-V color index | 0.22 |
| Variable type | DelSct |
| Astrometry | |
| Radial velocity (Rv) | −26.1 km/s |
| Proper motion (μ) | RA: 536.82 mas/yr Dec.: 385.54 mas/yr |
| Parallax (π) | 194.97 ± 0.86 mas |
| Distance | 16.73 ± 0.07 ly (5.13 ± 0.02 pc) |
| Absolute magnitude (MV) | 2.22 |
| Details | |
| Mass | 1.7 M☉ |
| Radius | 1.7 R☉ |
| Luminosity | 10.7 L☉ |
| Temperature | 8,000 K |
| Metallicity | 200% Sun |
| Rotation | 6.5–10.4 hours |
| Age | <109 years |
| Other designations | |
Altair (α Aql / α Aquilae / Alpha Aquilae / Atair) is the brightest star in the constellation Aquila and the twelfth brightest star in the nighttime sky, at visual magnitude 0.77.
Description
Altair is a vertex of the Summer Triangle. It is an "A" type or white star located 17 light years away from Earth (about 159 trillion kilometers or 100 trillion miles), one of the closest stars visible to the naked eye. Altair is most notable for its extremely rapid rotation; by measuring the width of its spectral lines, it was determined that its equator does a complete rotation in about 6½ hours (various other sources give 9 hours, or 10.4 hours). For comparison, our Sun requires just over 25 days for a complete rotation. As a result of its rapid rotation, Altair is oblate: its equatorial diameter is at least 22 percent greater than its polar diameter. Recently, images of the surface of Altair have been captured. This is the first visual verification of gravity darkening.
Altair, along with Beta Aquilae and Gamma Aquilae, form the well-known line of stars sometimes referred to as the shaft of Aquila.
Location
The star's location in the constellation of Aquila is shown in the following map:
Etymology
The name "Altaïr" is Arabic for "the Flying", from the phrase الطير. The spelling "Atair" is also used frequently. The name was given by Arabic astronomers and adopted by Western astronomers.
It is officially known as 河鼓二 (Hégǔ'èr, the Second Star of the Drum at the River, or more literally, Riverdrum II) in Chinese. However, it is more famously known as its other names: 牵牛星 or 牛郎星 (the Star of the Cowherd), after the Cowherd in the Chinese mythology: the Cowherd and the Weaver Girl; the star's Japanese name of Hikoboshi derives from this same myth.
Altair in mythology and culture
In Chinese mythology, there is a love story of Qi Xi in which Niu Lang (Altair) and his two children (Aquila -β and -γ) are separated forever from their mother Zhi Nü (Vega) who is on the far side of the river, the Milky Way. The Japanese Tanabata festival is also based on this legend.
In astrology, the star Altair was ill-omened, portending danger from reptiles.
The NASA Constellation Program announced "Altair" as the name of the Lunar Surface Access Module (LSAM) on December 13, 2007.
See also
- Altair in fiction
External links
- Report on ultra high-resolution photograph.
- SolStation
- Secrets of Sun-like star probed
- Astronomers Capture First Images of the Surface Features of Altair
Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia; from the article "Altair". Image Credit.
