1 Ceres's 4.6-year orbit around the Sun will carry it to its closest point to the Sun – its perihelion – at a distance of 2.55 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 Cambridge, at the moment of perihelion it will not be readily observable since it will be very close to the Sun, at a separation of only 19° from it.
A chart of the path of 1 Ceres across the sky in 2013 can be found here, and a chart of its rising and setting times here.
The position of 1 Ceres at the moment it passes perihelion will be:
| Object | Right Ascension | Declination | Constellation | Magnitude | Angular Size |
| 1 Ceres | 10h59m40s | 14°28'N | Leo | 8.6 | 0.0" |
The coordinates above are given in J2000.0.
The sky on 27 Nov 2024
| The sky on 27 November 2024 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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9% 26 days old |
All times shown in EST.
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Warning
Never attempt to point a pair of binoculars or a telescope at an object close to the Sun. Doing so may result in immediate and permanent blindness.
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
| 16 Dec 2012 | – 1 Ceres at opposition |
| 14 Apr 2014 | – 1 Ceres at opposition |
| 24 Jul 2015 | – 1 Ceres at opposition |
| 20 Oct 2016 | – 1 Ceres at opposition |
Image credit
© NASA/Dawn 2015