Facts about Auriga Constellation
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M37, one of Auriga's three brightest open star clusters, contains approximately 150 stars and spans roughly 24 light-years across at its distance of 4,400 light-years.
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Auriga Constellation's star AE Aurigae moves through space at approximately 26 kilometers per second, leaving a visible bow shock as it plows through surrounding interstellar dust and gas.
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Auriga Constellation spans approximately 657 square degrees of sky, making it the eleventh largest constellation visible from Earth's northern hemisphere.
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About 2,000 light-years away, Auriga Constellation hosts the remarkable variable star Zeta Aurigae, which dims by nearly one magnitude every 972 days when its cool supergiant eclipses its hot companion star.
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Auriga Constellation contains M36, M37, and M38, three open star clusters visible to the naked eye that are each estimated to be between 100 and 220 million years old.
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Located about 2,000 light-years away, the emission nebula IC 405 in Auriga Constellation glows red from hydrogen gas energized by the nearby hot star AE Aurigae.
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In 1921, astronomers discovered that Auriga Constellation contains Epsilon Aurigae, an eclipsing binary star system with an orbital period of 27 years, one of the longest known.
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The brightest star in Auriga Constellation, Capella, is actually a binary system of two giant yellow stars orbiting each other every 104 days.