AE Aurigae (abbreviated as AE Aur) is a runaway star in the

constellation A constellation is an area on the celestial sphere in which a group of visible stars forms Asterism (astronomy), a perceived pattern or outline, typically representing an animal, mythological subject, or inanimate object. The first constellati ...

Auriga; it lights the Flaming Star Nebula.

Description

AE Aurigae is a blue O-type main sequence star with a mean

apparent magnitude Apparent magnitude () is a measure of the Irradiance, brightness of a star, astronomical object or other celestial objects like artificial satellites. Its value depends on its intrinsic luminosity, its distance, and any extinction (astronomy), ...

of +6.0, making it faintly visible to the

naked eye Naked eye, also called bare eye or unaided eye, is the practice of engaging in visual perception unaided by a magnification, magnifying, Optical telescope#Light-gathering power, light-collecting optical instrument, such as a telescope or microsc ...

under very good observing conditions. It was discovered to be a

variable star A variable star is a star whose brightness as seen from Earth (its apparent magnitude) changes systematically with time. This variation may be caused by a change in emitted light or by something partly blocking the light, so variable stars are ...

by Daniel Walter Morehouse, in 1923, and received its

variable star designation In astronomy, a variable-star designation is a unique identifier given to variable stars. It extends the Bayer designation format, with an identifying label (as described below) preceding the Latin genitive of the name of the constellation in whic ...

in 1924. It is classified as an Orion type variable star and its brightness varies irregularly between magnitudes +5.78 and +6.08. It is approximately 1,300

light-years A light-year, alternatively spelled light year (ly or lyr), is a unit of length used to express astronomical distances and is equal to exactly , which is approximately 9.46 trillion km or 5.88 trillion mi. As defined by the International Astro ...

from

Earth Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to Planetary habitability, harbor life. This is enabled by Earth being an ocean world, the only one in the Solar System sustaining liquid surface water. Almost all ...

. It is a runaway star that might have been ejected during a collision of two binary star groups. This collision, which also is credited with ejecting Mu Columbae and possibly 53 Arietis, has been traced to the Trapezium cluster in the

Orion Nebula The Orion Nebula (also known as Messier 42, M42, or NGC 1976) is a diffuse nebula in the Milky Way situated south of Orion's Belt in the Orion (constellation), constellation of Orion, and is known as the middle "star" in the "sword" of Orion. It ...

two million years ago. The binary Iota Orionis may have been the other half of this collision. IC405 Flaming Star Nebula from the Mount Lemmon SkyCenter Schulman Telescope courtesy Adam Block

IC405 Flaming Star Nebula from the Mount Lemmon SkyCenter Schulman Telescope courtesy Adam Block

AE Aur is seen to light up the Flaming Star nebula, but it was not formed within it. Instead it is passing through the nebula at high speed and producing a violent bow shock and high energy electromagnetic radiation.

Companions

Two candidate companion stars have been detected at

angular distance Angular distance or angular separation is the measure of the angle between the orientation (geometry), orientation of two straight lines, ray (geometry), rays, or vector (geometry), vectors in three-dimensional space, or the central angle subtende ...

s of 8.4 and 0.35, respectively, but these are thought to be unrelated, optical companions. A new potential companion was discovered using the CHARA array in 2023. In December 2017, it had an angular separation from AE Aurigae of 6.85 mas, and in September 2018 it had an angular separation of 1.74 mas.

References

1712 In the Swedish calendar it began as a leap year starting on Monday and remained so until Thursday, February 29. By adding a second leap day, Friday, February 30, Sweden reverted to the Julian calendar and the rest of the year (from Saturday, M ...

Aurigae, AE

Description

Companions

References

External links