Celestial coordinate system

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In astronomy, a celestial coordinate system is a coordinate system for mapping positions in the sky. There are different celestial coordinate systems each using a coordinate grid projected on the celestial sphere, in analogy to the geographic coordinate system used on the surface of the Earth. The coordinate systems differ only in their choice of the fundamental plane, which divides the sky into two equal hemispheres along a great circle. (The fundamental plane of the geographic system is the Earth's equator). Each coordinate system is named for its choice of fundamental plane; below the name of a pole and the names of the coordinates are also shown:

[edit] Converting coordinates

[edit] Equatorial to horizontal coordinates

Let δ be the declination and H the hour angle.

Let φ be the observer's latitude.

Let Alt be the altitude and Az the azimuth.

Let θ be the zenith angle (or zenith distance, i.e. the 90° complement of Alt).

Then the equations of the transformation are:

\sin \mathrm{Alt} = \cos \theta = \sin \phi \cdot \sin \delta + \cos \phi \cdot \cos \delta \cdot \cos H


\cos \mathrm{Az} = \frac{\cos \phi \cdot \sin \delta - \sin \phi \cdot \cos \delta \cdot \cos H}{\cos \mathrm{Alt}}.

Use the inverse trigonometric functions to get the values of the coordinates.

This article originates from Jason Harris' Astroinfo which comes along with KStars, a Desktop Planetarium for Linux/KDE. See http://edu.kde.org/kstars/index.phtml

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