Hopefully Michael Keaton won't show up on your doorstep after you read this

“Betelgeuse” [Alpha Orionis]
 
 

Name

As American astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson stated in his speeches “The Perimeter of Ignorance”; at the Beyond Belief: Science, Reason, Religion and Survival symposium on November 5, 2006 at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in San Diego, California; and “Adventures in Science Literacy or the Brain Dropping of a Skeptic”; at the Amazing Meeting: I, Skeptic—Modern Skepticism in the Internet Age on June 19-22, 2008 in Las Vegas, Nevada:

“Of all the stars that have names, two thirds of them have Arabic names… While the constellations are Greek and Roman, the names are Arabic.”

The ten brightest stars in the sky are no exception. Ninth on that list is the second-brightest star in the constellation of Orion [30]. It’s Latin name in Alpha Orionis, but in English we call it “Betelgeuse”.

As with those of other stars, the name “Betelgeuse” is derived from Arabic. The Arabic word “Ibt” [transliterated as “Abet”] means “Armpit”. The Arabic word “Jwz” [“Jauz”] means “Middle” or “The Center of Anything”, and “Al-Jawza” means “The Central One”, an Arabic word for the constellation of Orion. “Al-Dshauza” means “The Giant”, another Arabic word for Orion. So the Arabic “Ibt Al-Jauza” means “Armpit of Orion”.

Elsewhere, Alpha Orionis was known as “Yad Al Jawza”, meaning “The Hand of Orion”. [The Arabic “Al Yad Al Yamna” means “The Right Hand”.] In his 1944 Popular Astronomy article “The Pronunciations, Derivations, and Meanings of a Selected List of Star Names”, George Davis puts forward an alternative English translation for the Arabic phrase “Yad Al-Dshauza”: “The Forefoot of the White-Belted Sheep” [21].

During the middle Ages, the “Y” [“Ya”] was misread as a “B” [“Ba”] in a mistranslitertion to Medieval Latin, and so during the Renaissance  “Yad Al-Jawza” became “Bed Al-Gueze”. In his 1899 book “Star Names: Their Lore and Meaning”, polymath and amateur naturalist Richard Hinckley Allen traces this through late 16^th century German orientalist Jakob Christmann and early 17^th century English writer and translator Edmund Chilmead, whose Arabic translations changed from “Bet Al-Gueze” [translated as “Armpit of Orion”] to “Bed Al-Gueze” [“Orion’s Hand”], to “Led Elgueze” [“House of Orion”] and finally to “Betelgueze” [1].

Other ancient civilizations also had names for the eighth brightest star in the celestial sphere. In Sanskrit, it is “Ardra” [“The Moist One”]. To the Persians, it was “Basn” [“The Arm”]. In Coptic, it was “Klaria” [“The Armlet”]. To the Macedonians, it was “Orach” [“The Ploughman”]. To the Inuit, Betelgeuse is “Ulluriajjuaq” [“Large Star”], and together with Bellatrix are “Akuttujuuk” [“Those Two Placed Far Apart”]. In Hawaii, it is “Kaulua-Koko” [“Brilliant Red Star”], and in Tahitian it is “Ta’urua-nui-O-Mere” [meaning “Great Festivity in Parental Yearnings”].

Classification and Color

In his March 20, 2000 Astrophysical Journal article “Betelgeuse and its Variations”, University of Western Ontario Professor Emeritus of Physics and Astronomy David Gray estimated the mass of Alpha Orionis at five to thirty times the mass of our sun [25]. In “Weighing Betelgeuse” in the September 21, 2011 Proceedings of the Pacific Rim Conference on Stellar Astrophysics, East Tennessee State University Research Assistant Professor of Physics and Astronomy Hilding Neilson and University of Sydney Research Only Postdoctoral Fellow Dr. Xavier Haubois determined a mass for Betelgeuse of 11.6 times the mass of our sun by measuring a mass of 7.7 to 16.6 solar masses [28].

Forming ten to twelve million years ago as a fifteen to twenty solar-mass star, a member of a high mass multiple system within its birthplace, the Orion OB1 Association, Alpha Orionis was ejected from Ori OB1a, which includes the stars in Orion’s Belt. [11] Betelgeuse is now a Spectral Class M Intermediate Luminous Red Supergiant, one of the largest, most luminous and most ethereal observable stars known. The age of Class M Supergiants with an initial mass twenty times the mass of our sun is 10 million years.

According to 20^th century German-born astronomer Hermann Alexander Bruck, 19^th century Italian astronomer Pietro Angelo Secchi considered Betelgeuse the prototype for his orange-to-red Class III stellar classification [13].  According to early 15^th century Persian astronomer and mathematician Mirza Muhammad Taraghay Bin Shahrukh, in his 1437 star catalogue “Zij-I Sultani” [32], the second-century Greco-Roman mathematician, astronomer and geographer Claudius Ptolemy described the color of Betelgeuse with the Latin words:

“Stella Lucida in umero dextro, quae ad rubedinem vergit.”

[“Bright star in right shoulder, which inclines to ruddiness.”]

However, observations by Chinese astronomers, who called Betelgeuse “Shenxiusi” [“The Fourth Star of the Constellation of Three Stars”], around the beginning of the Common Era suggest that it was then a yellow supergiant [36].

Brightness, Luminosity and Temperature

Though it emits 16,000 times more visible light than our sun, only thirteen percent of Alpha Orionis’ radiant energy is emitted in the form of visible light. Most of its light comes in the infrared, making it the brightest near-infrared source in the sky [14].

Early 17^th century German uranographer and celestial cartographer Johann Bayer, in his 1603 star atlas “Uranomeria: Omnium Asterismorum Continens Schemata, Nova Methodo Delineata, Aereis Laminis Expressa” [“Measuring the Sky, Containing Charts of All the Constellations, Drawn by a New Method and Engraved on Copper Plates”] [32], designated Betelgeuse “Alpha”, as it rivaled the brighter Rigel, which he designated “Beta”.

The surface temperature for the outer layers of an M-Class Red Supergiant is 3,100 degrees Kelvin. In April 2001, University of Dublin School of Physics Director of Teaching and Learning Undergraduate Physics Graham Harper reported a surface temperature for Betelgeuse of 3,300 degrees Kelvin, by estimating temperatures of 3,140 to 3,641 degrees Kelvin [12]. In the May 2012 Astronomy and Astrophysics, University of Bonn Argelander Institute for Astronomy astrophysicist Dr. Norbert Langer reported a temperature for Alpha Orionis of 3,300 degrees Kelvin and a luminosity of 120,000 times the luminosity of our sun [33]. In the November 1998 Astronomical Journal, Harvard-Smithsonian Center For Astrophysics [CFA] Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory [SAO] senior astrophysicist Andrea Dupree and Pennsylvania State University Eberly College of Science Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics Professor of Practice Ronald Gilliland indicated a region in the Southwest quadrant of Alpha Orionis that is 2,000 degrees Kelvin hotter than the surface [23]. 

Alpha Orionis rotates at five kilometers per second at an axis inclination of 55 degrees from celestial North and twenty degrees to the direction of Earth. It takes 25 to 32 years to rotate on its axis [38]. Alpha Orionis has a period of 5.7 years, and has been observed moving through the interstellar medium at a supersonic speed of thirty kilometers per second, or 6.3 Astronomical Units per year. This produces a bow shock four light years wide [33][34].

Distance from Earth

In the May 1921 Astrophysical Journal, German-born American physicist Albert Michelson, the first American to win the Nobel Prize in Physics, and American astronomer Francis Pease measured a distance from the Earth to Alpha Orionis of 180 light years, or 56 parsecs [39].  In October 1995, the Yale University Observatory published a distance of 330 light years, or 102 parsecs [2]. In July 1997, the European Space Agency’s High Precision Parallax Collecting Satellite [HIPPARCOS] estimated a distance of 430 light years, or 131 parsecs [3].  In the April 2008 Astronomical Journal, Trinity College Lecturer Graham Harper; using the Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array [VLA] near Magdalena on the Plains of San Augustin in the Middle Rio Grande Valley American Viticultural Area [AVA] in Socorro County, New Mexico; produced a distance from Earth for Alpha Orionis of 643 light years, or 197 parsecs [11].

On its projected pathway, Alpha Orionis will not intersect with the 25 Ori Subassociation, or Ori OB1d Orion Nebular Cluster [ONC], at a distance of 389 to 414 parsecs [11].

Size

In the May 2004 Astronomy and Astrophysics, the Paris Observatory’s Guy Perrin produced a measurement of the radius of Alpha Orionis of 3.4 Astronomical Units, or 730 times the radius of the sun [18]. According to University of Cambridge Institute of Astronomy Technical Director of Space Projects Dr. Floor Van Leeuwen in the February 1, 2008 Astronomy and Astrophysics, HIPPARCOS estimated the radius of Alpha Orionis at 3.6 Astronomical Units [35]. In the December 1, 2000 Astrophysical Journal, University of California—Berkeley Space Sciences Laboratory [SSL] Mission Operations Center Lead Scientist and Director of Operations Manfred Bester produced a radius measurement for Alpha Orionis of 5.6 Astronomical Units, or 1,200 times the radius of the sun [20]. In May 1921, Michelson and Pease measured the diameter of Alpha Orionis at 3.84 x 10^8 kilometers, or 2.58 Astronomical Units [39]. In February 2008, HIPPARCOS estimated a diameter for Betelgeuse of 1,500 times the diameter of our sun [35].

If Betelgeuse were Empire Stadium in Wembley Park in London, England, then our Sun would be the size of a mango, and the Earth would be a pearl one-millimeter in diameter. If Alpha Orionis were to replace our sun at the center of our solar system, it would engulf Mercury, Venus, the Earth and Mars at 1.5 Astronomical Units, and its surface would extend past Ceres in the asteroid belt at 2.7 Astronomical Units and past the orbit of Jupiter at 5.5 Astronomical Units, not quite reaching Saturn at 9.5 Astronomical Units.

In the April 20, 2001 Astrophysical Journal, Graham Harper estimated Alpha Orionis’ mass loss to be 0.03 solar masses every 10,000 years [12]. However, in the June 1, 2009 Astrophysical Journal, University of California—Berkeley Professor of the Graduate School of Experimental Astrophysics Charles Townes, the Nobel-Prize-winning inventor of the laser, reported that Betelgeuse had shrunk by fifteen percent, or 0.9 Astronomical Units [equal to the orbit of Venus] in the last fifteen years, from 5.5 Astronomical Units in 1993 to 4.6 Astronomical Units in 2009 [19] [27] [40].

References Cited:

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