1 Ceres's 4.6-year orbit around the Sun will carry it to its furthest point to the Sun – its aphelion – at a distance of 2.99 AU.
In practice, however, 1 Ceres's orbit is very close to circular; its distance from the Sun only varies by about 17.2% between perihelion and aphelion. This means that the difference in the amount of heat and light it receives from the Sun between aphelion and perihelion is extremely small.
Finding 1 Ceres
1 Ceres's distance from the Sun doesn't affect its appearance. From Los Angeles, at the moment of aphelion it will be visible in the dawn sky, rising at 02:24 (PDT) – 3 hours and 16 minutes before the Sun – and reaching an altitude of 23° above the south-eastern horizon before fading from view as dawn breaks at around 04:29.
A chart of the path of 1 Ceres across the sky in 2011 can be found here, and a chart of its rising and setting times here.
The position of 1 Ceres at the moment it passes aphelion will be:
| Object | Right Ascension | Declination | Constellation | Magnitude | Angular Size |
| 1 Ceres | 23h52m00s | 11°55'S | Aquarius | 9.1 | 0.0" |
The coordinates above are given in J2000.0.
The sky on 6 Jul 2024
| The sky on 6 July 2024 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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3% 1 day old |
All times shown in PDT.
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Source
The circumstances of this event were computed using the DE430 planetary ephemeris published by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL).
This event was automatically generated by searching the ephemeris for planetary alignments which are of interest to amateur astronomers, and the text above was generated based on an estimate of your location.
Related news
| 18 Jun 2010 | – 1 Ceres at opposition |
| 15 Sep 2011 | – 1 Ceres at opposition |
| 17 Dec 2012 | – 1 Ceres at opposition |
| 14 Apr 2014 | – 1 Ceres at opposition |
Image credit
© NASA/Dawn 2015