Talk:Beta Centauri

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[edit] Nighttime sky?

The opening reads:

"Beta Centauri (β Cen / β Centauri), also known as Hadar or Agena, is the second brightest star in the constellation Centaurus and the tenth brightest star in the nighttime sky."

I'm contemplating a grammatical correction. The term "nighttime sky" might read better as "night sky":

"Beta Centauri (β Cen / β Centauri), also known as Hadar or Agena, is the second brightest star in the constellation Centaurus and the tenth brightest star in the night sky." Ricardo10 18:52, 25 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Dubious distance

The distance given is dubious. The distance is given as 525 light years, however recent research suggests that the distance is more like 330 light years. The HIPPARCOS probe ran into systemic difficulties measuring the distance of this particular system. The two bright components have an orbital period of about 350 days, and when this was superimposed on the 365-day parallax cycle it skewed the results. The following references discuss this in more detail.