Mu Cephei -The Garnet Star.

 

Mu Cephei, Red Hyper-giant star in the  constellation Cepheus. Image Credit: Pip Stakkert at the JPO. Data Credit: PIRATE robotic telescope, Tenerife. Open Observatories, Open University, telescope.org.

" Mu Cephei also known as 'The Garnet Star' and discovered by William Herschel in 1783, is high over the JPO at the moment. We hope, at some point, to use one of our many spectrometers to capture its interesting spectrum (Spectral Class M2 la)

The star has a radius roughly 1500 times the radius of our Sun. If it were to take the place of the Sun, its surface would extend to somewhere between the orbits of Mars and Saturn.

It is only 10 million years old but because of its size, it has used all of its non metal fuse-able fuel. It will at some point relatively soon, lose the battle with gravity and implode as a core collapse supernova to end its days as a Black Hole.

Thankfully, 'The Garnet Star' is a very long way from Earth at an estimated distance between 2400 and 2900 light years! We will be quite safe!

". -Kurt Thrust current Director of the Jodrell Plank Observatory.

Making every photon count!

 

" The revised design spectrometer with a 50 lines/mm grating is virtually complete. This design maintains the Seestar's 30mm aperture throughout the light train. We hope to make every photon count and maximise the brightness of spectra captured. 

The washing line clamps (aka pegs) in the above photograph are surprisingly effective, when supergluing PETG plastic parts together.

We did receive complaints from our sponsor, Anita, who was trying to get the JPO laundry dry ! 🤣

Jolene has also 3d printed sufficient parts to make a 80 lines/mm spectrometer but unfortunately we have run out of the appropriate film grating. We have placed two orders with companies in China and await delivery sometime in mid November.

Weather forecasts for the next couple of days in Lowestoft are not good, so it might be some time before we can test this revised device.

Professor Chrissy H has started compiling the code for the new spectra processing software but has informed me that it will probably be computer based rather than a phone app. It will also be generic rather than solely useable with the Seestar smartscope range.

So all is moving forward 👍" - Joel Cairo CEO of the Jodrell Plank Observatory