Copyright:
Tomáš Slovinský
中文翻譯:
在寬廣的星空中，流星雨有一個神秘的來源！你知道嗎？這些流星就像是一群小星星從天而降，它們來自於雙子星座（Gemini）！每年十二月，我們會看到一場精彩的流星雨，名叫雙子座流星雨（Geminids）。這些流星其實是來自一顆特別的小行星，名叫3200 Phaethon。當地球穿過這些小顆粒的軌道時，我們就能看到流星從雙子座出現。最近，從斯洛伐克的高山上，一些可愛的流星劃過天空，還有明亮的星星，如卡斯托爾（Castor）在附近閃耀。這些都是自然的奇跡，我們可以好好欣賞這宇宙的美麗！
原文:
Where are all of these meteors coming from? In terms of direction on the sky, the pointed answer is the constellation of Gemini. That is why the major meteor shower in December is known as the Geminids — because shower meteors all appear to come from a radiant toward Gemini. Three dimensionally, however, sand-sized debris expelled from the unusual asteroid 3200 Phaethon follows a well-defined orbit about our Sun, and the part of the orbit that approaches Earth is superposed in front of the constellation of Gemini. Therefore, when Earth crosses this orbit, the radiant point of falling debris appears in Gemini. Featured here is a composite of many images taken over the past few days through dark skies from Slovakia and capturing the snow-covered peaks of the Belianske Tatra mountains Numerous bright meteor streaks from the Geminids meteor shower are visible. Orion is visible above the horizon, while the bright star nearest the radiant is Castor. APOD Review: RJN’s Night Sky Network Lecture
來源:NASA每日圖片
