The Great Jaguar Final

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Salt Lake Community College

The Great Jaguar

Kassidy Kelsch PHYS 1040 406 Professor Janalee Harrison 11 April 2019

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MYTHOLOGY Many ancient societies that thrived centuries ago all have one thing in common, they all looked to the stars to predict patterns, gaze at, and fulfill mythologies. One of these societies include the Ancient Aztecs which inhabited ancient Mexico from the years 1345 CE to 1521 CE. According to the Aztecs the world was wrestled away from the giant earth monster named Tlaltecuhtli.

It was wrestled away from them by two gods, Quetzacoatl and Tezcatlipoca.

Tezcatlipoca lost his foot to the giant jaws of the earth monster and is often depicted with no right foot or something substituting his foot. Once the world was free from the monster the gods appointed Tezcatlipoca head god and sun for the new world. He could shape the world into what ever he wanted. Tezcatlipoca created humans the size of mountains. After a while Tezcatlipoca noticed that the other deities weren’t liking this world and in a fit of rage sent his beloved pet jaguars to Earth to slaughter the giant human race. He was then cast out of the pantheon of Aztec gods but still had a huge cult following by many. According to the Aztec creation myth, we are living under the fifth sun, or world, created by Huitzilopochtli, the god of war, sun, fire, and hummingbirds. The Aztecs believed themselves to be the chosen people and called themselves “The People Of The Sun”. Tezcatlipoca was the Aztec god of dark magic, necromancy, jaguars, the night sky and trickery. He was also the god of the smoking mirror which was the Aztec’s analogy for the ever changing surface of Earth; he was so synonymous

(Maciel) - The constellation Ursa Major, depicted by red dots, on top of an ancient depiction of a jaguar. Blue lines added by Kassidy Kelsch.

with the smoking mirror that it replaced his missing foot in almost all ancient depictions of him.

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After Tezcatlipoca slaughtered the world of giants with his numerous predators of the night, jaguars, the Aztecs believed that he rose to the sky in the form of a great celestial jaguar, a constellation that we called Ursa Major. When the jaguar constellation dipped its foot into the sea, below the horizon, the Aztecs believed that it nodded to their cosmic creation myth where Tezcatlipoca lost his foot to the giant earth monster. (Philips, 167) CONSTELLATION In western culture Ursa Major takes the form of a giant bear, translated from Latin, Ursa Major means “large bear.” This constellation starts with the star Alkaid which begins at the handle of the big dipper. The handle goes down in a curve into the basin which is made out of four stars, two of which, Merak and Dubhe, point straight towards the north star. From these stars the constellation makes a triangle with the star Muscida. From the middle of this triangle extends a leg that ends at the star Talitha. The other leg extends from Phecda, one of the stars that make up the basin of the big dipper, and it separates into two legs. The first one extends to Tania Australis while the second one extends Alula Australis. Ursa Major’s surrounding constellations include Boötes, Camelopardalis, Canes Venatici, Coma Berenices, Draco, Leo, Leo Minor, and Lynx. It is the third largest constellation in the night sky spanning an approximate area of 1280 square degrees or about 2100 arcminutes by 2190 arcminutes. Ursa Major has an approximate right ascension from 8 hours and 8 minutes, to 14 hours and 15 minutes. It also has an approximate declination of +28 degrees to +63 degrees. Ursa Major is seen in the Northern Hemisphere all year long and seen between the latitudes of +90 degrees and -30 degrees and is located in the second quadrant of the Northern Hemisphere. (Admin, Ursa Major Constellation)

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20 Brightest Stars in Ursa Major (Sorter by Visual Magnitude) Designation and Name

RA

Dec

ε UMa Alioth

12h 54m 01.63s

+55° 57′ 35.4″

α UMa Dubhe η UMa Alkaid ζ1 UMa Mizar

11h 03m 43.84s 13h 47m 32.55s 13h 23m 55.54s

β UMa Mirak γ UMa Phecda ψ UMa Ta Tsun μ UMa Tania Australis ι UMa Talitha, Dnoces θ UMa Sarir Bonet δ UMa Megrez ο UMa Muscida λ UMa Tania Borealis ν UMa Alula Borealis κ UMa Talitha Australis 23 UMa χ UMa Alkafzah υ UMa ξ UMa A Alula Australis ζ UMa B Mizar B

Distance (In Light Years)

Visual Magnitude

Spectral and Luminosity classification

Other Notes

81

1.76

A0p

+61° 45′ 04.0″ +49° 18′ 47.9″ +54° 55′ 31.3″

124

1.81

F7V comp

101

1.85

B3V SB

Has a brown dwarf companion. An alpha2 canum venaticorum variable star. The brightest star in Ursa Major, and 32nd brightest in night sky. The youngest star in Ursa Major, will live the longest

83

2.23

A2V SB

11h 01m 50.39s 11h 53m 49.74s

+56° 22′ 56.4″ +53° 41′ 41.0″

79

2.34

A1V

84

2.41

A0V SB

11h 09m 39.86s 10h 22m 19.80s

+44° 29′ 54.8″ +41° 29′ 58.0″

147

3.00

K1III

249

3.06

M0III SB

Semiregular variable star.

08h 59m 12.84s

+48° 02′ 32.5″

48

3.12

A7IV

Quadruple Star.

09h 32m 52.33s 12h 15m 25.45s 08h 30m 16.03s 10h 17m 05.93s

+51° 40′ 43.0″ +57° 01′ 57.4″ +60° 43′ 06.4″ +42° 54′ 52.1″

44

3.17

F6IV

81

3.32

A3Vvar

Closest star in Ursa Major to Earth.

184

3.35

G4II-III

134

3.45

A2IV

11h 18m 28.76s

+33° 05′ 39.3″

421

3.49

K3III SB

09h 03m 37.56s

+47° 09′ 24.0″

423

3.57

A1Vn

09h 31m 31.57s 11h 46m 03.13s 09h 50m 59.69s 11h 18m 11.24s

+63° 03′ 42.5″ +47° 46′ 45.6″ +59° 02′ 20.8″ +31° 31′ 50.8″

75

3.65

F0IV

196

3.69

K0III

115

3.78

F0IV

A Delta Scuti Star.

27.3

3.79

G0V

13h 23m 56.33s

+54° 55′ 18.56″

83

3.88

A3m

An RS Canum Venaticorum variable star; also a binary star. Closest star in Ursa Major to Earth. Most similar star to Earth’s sun. A spectroscopic binary, visual double star with Mizar A, naked eye binary with Alcor.

“List of Stars in Ursa Major.” From Wikipedia.com.

Spectroscopic binary, visual double star with Mizar B, naked eye binary with alcor. The oldest star in Ursa Major, will be the first star in Ursa Major to die.

Has a planet orbiting it.

Furthest star in Ursa Major from Earth.

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THE CIGAR GALAXY The Cigar Galaxy, also known as Messier 82, is one of the many galaxies that inhibit the Ursa Major constellation. It has a right ascension of about 09h 55m 52.2s and a declination of +69°40’47”. Messier 82 is about 11.4 – 12.4 million light years away from Earth and has less (Admin, Messier 82) - An infrared picture of The Cigar Galaxy as observed by NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope back in 2005.

than 30 billion stars inhabiting it. It is an irregular starburst galaxy that is seen edge on from here and

it has a visual magnitude of 6.9. (Admin, Messier 82) On January 21, 2014, a type 1a supernova by the name of SN 2014J was found in this galaxy in a spot where there was none before, it was just born into existence when it was discovered. Founded by the University of London Observatory in London, UK, it was the closest of its type to Earth in over 40 years and was several times brighter than our own Milky Way Galaxy and was one of the brightest galaxies in our northern sky. Type la supernovas are very exciting for astronomers because they are used to understand the scale of the cosmos. This one was particularly exciting due to the fact that it was just barely born and we can now learn a lot about it’s evolution and infer the properties of this supernova’s progenitor star. (Admin, Messier 82)

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There is also an unknown object in this galaxy. Founded in April 2010, strange radio waves were emitting from an object in the Cigar Galaxy. To this day we do not know what is emitting these waves but we do know that it is close to the galaxy’s center and is not associated with the black hole at the center of Messier 82. (Admin, Messier 82) The Cigar Galaxy

was

(Admin, Messier 82) - Composite image of Messier 82 from many different telescopes. X-Ray data appears blue, infrared light appears in red, hydrogen emission appears in orange, and bluest visible light appears in yellow-green.

officially

discovered in August of 1779 by Pierre Méchain in tandem with the discovery of Messier 81 also known as Bode’s Galaxy. It was added to Charles Messier’s catalogue on February 9, 1781. Messier 81 and 82 were described by its founder as “two nebulous stars at the ear of the Great Bear.” (Admin, Messier 82) THE OWL NEBULA Founded in 1789 by Pierre Méchain, Messier 97, also known as the Owl Nebula, is found in Ursa Major and appears to have two round shaped “owl eyes”. Messier 97 is a planetary nebula with a right ascension of 11 hours 14 minutes and 47.734 seconds and has a declination of +55°01’08.50”. This nebula is approximately 2,030 light years away from Earth and is around 8,000 years old. (Admin, Messier 97) The Owl Nebula has a visual magnitude of 7.5 and is able to be seen by 20 by 80 binoculars and small telescopes. Expanding at a velocity from 27 to 39 km/s, Messier 97 has been expanding and will completely disperse over the next several thousand years. This nebula has an

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estimated temperature of about 123,000 K and is about 41 to 148 times brighter than our Sun. (Admin, Messier 97) When the nebula collapsed, the central star expelled matter in opposite directions that resulted in the nebula’s owl-like appearance: along with this the Messier 97 has three concentric shells, the inner shell is not perfectly symmetric which forms a barrel like structure that gives the nebula owl eyes. The outermost shell is around 20%-30% larger than the inner shell, the barrel like structure is aligned 45 degrees to our line of sight. The white dwarf at the center of this nebula is about 0.7 solar masses while the whole nebula contains about 0.13 solar masses of material which includes (Admin, Messier 97) - The Owl Nebula, also known as Messier 97.

hydrogen, helium, nitrogen, oxygen, and sulphur. (Admin. Messier 97)

Although officially discovered in 1781, the Owl Nebula’s outer halo wasn’t detected until 1991. Due to the star’s collapse from red giant to white dwarf this former star is now heated by the radiation of its central white dwarf star which produces the nebula’s glow. Because of this glow Messier 97 appears brighter in viewing than in photographs because the majority of its light emits in one green spectral line. (Admin, Messier 97)

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Bibliography Admin. “Ursa Major Constellation.” Constellation Guide, Apr. 2012, www.constellation-guide.com/constellation-list/ursa-major-constellation/.

Admin. “Messier 82: Cigar Galaxy.” Messier Objects, 8 Aug. 2015, www.messier-objects.com/messier-82-cigar-galaxy/.

Admin. “Messier 97: Owl Nebula.” Messier Objects, 25 Aug. 2015, www.messier-objects.com/messier-97-owl-nebula/#.

“List of Stars in Ursa Major.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 13 May 2018, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_stars_in_Ursa_Major.

Phillips, Charles. The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Aztec & Maya: the Greatest Civilizations of Ancient Central America with 1000 Photographs, Paintings & Maps. Hermes House, Anness Publishing Ltd, 2017.

Maciel, Francisco Jesús Hernández (Akapochtli). “File:Ocelotl Jaguar.JPG.” Wikimedia Commons, Wikimedia Project, 23 Feb. 2008, commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ocelotl_Jaguar.JPG. (Blue lines added by author of this essay, Kassidy Kelsch.)