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 2.54 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 Fairfield, at the moment of perihelion it will be visible in the dawn sky, rising at 23:58 (EDT) and reaching an altitude of 57° above the south-eastern horizon before fading from view as dawn breaks at around 05:52.
A chart of the path of 1 Ceres across the sky in 2045 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 | 12h05m00s | 10°46'N | Virgo | 8.4 | 0.0" |
The coordinates above are given in J2000.0.
The sky on 21 May 2024
| The sky on 21 May 2024 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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96% 13 days old |
All times shown in EDT.
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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
| 26 Nov 2044 | – 1 Ceres at opposition |
| 20 Mar 2046 | – 1 Ceres at opposition |
| 06 Jul 2047 | – 1 Ceres at opposition |
| 02 Oct 2048 | – 1 Ceres at opposition |
Image credit
© NASA/Dawn 2015