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The Sun, in its apparent motion along the ecliptic, crosses the celestial equator at these points, one from south to north, the other from north to south. [6] The crossing from south to north is known as the March equinox, also known as the first point of Aries and the ascending node of the ecliptic on the celestial equator. [10]
The equatorial describes the sky as seen from the Solar System, and modern star maps almost exclusively use equatorial coordinates. The equatorial system is the normal coordinate system for most professional and many amateur astronomers having an equatorial mount that follows the movement of the sky during the night. Celestial objects are found ...
A position in the equatorial coordinate system is thus typically specified true equinox and equator of date, mean equinox and equator of J2000.0, or similar. Note that there is no "mean ecliptic", as the ecliptic is not subject to small periodic oscillations. [5]
Like right ascension in the equatorial coordinate system, the primary direction (0° ecliptic longitude) points from the Earth towards the Sun at the March equinox. Because it is a right-handed system, ecliptic longitude is measured positive eastwards in the fundamental plane (the ecliptic) from 0° to 360°.
The celestial equator is currently inclined by about 23.44° to the ecliptic plane. The image shows the relations between Earth's axial tilt (or obliquity ), rotation axis , and orbital plane . The celestial equator is the great circle of the imaginary celestial sphere on the same plane as the equator of Earth .
The angle between the Earth's equatorial plane and the ecliptic, ε, is called the obliquity of the ecliptic and ε ≈ 23.4°. An equinox occurs when the earth is at a position in its orbit such that a vector from the earth toward the sun points to where the ecliptic intersects the celestial equator.
The declination of the Sun, δ ☉, is the angle between the rays of the Sun and the plane of the Earth's equator. The Earth's axial tilt (called the obliquity of the ecliptic by astronomers) is the angle between the Earth's axis and a line perpendicular to the Earth's orbit. The Earth's axial tilt changes slowly over thousands of years but its ...
Because right ascensions are measured in hours (of rotation of the Earth), they can be used to time the positions of objects in the sky. For example, if a star with RA = 1 h 30 m 00 s is at its meridian, then a star with RA = 20 h 00 m 00 s will be on the/at its meridian (at its apparent highest point) 18.5 sidereal hours later.