1. By: Cassidy Osborne

2. Proxima means closest because it is the star closest to the sun. Proxima is about 23 trillion miles away from Earth. http://www.windows2universe.org/the_universe/Pr oxima.html

3. Well Proxima is a very important star and it is a “red giant” with a surface temperature of 3330K. What is a red giant? A red giant is a star that expands and cools once it runs out of hydrogen fuel. These stars are not as red to our eyes as they are orange. Red Giant http://foxd3sign.deviantart.com/ar t/RED-GIANT-001-164580656

4.  Proxima is about 4.2 light years away from the sun. What is a light year? A light year is a unit of length equal to the distance that light travels through space in one year. http://www.clarkplanetarium.com/blog/wp- content/uploads/sun-prox-cent_4501.jpg

5.  It is 0.07 times the sun's radius. If you put Proxima at the location of our sun, you could just barely make out the disk.  A little bigger in volume than Jupiter. It emits 1/17,000 the luminosity of our Sun. http://www.google.com/imgres?hl=en&gbv=2&biw=1440&bih=809&tbm=isch&tbnid=uy bTzvdgpbA7OM:&imgrefurl=http://dotdotdot.ru/img/&docid=4lcN5FgllDoirM&imgurl=h ttp://dotdotdot.ru/img/Sun-Proxima-Jupiter.jpg&w=500&h=375&ei=heKVT5XSJ- imiQLVmK3rCQ&zoom=1&iact=hc&vpx=185&vpy=301&dur=1471&hovh=194&hovw=259 &tx=149&ty=116&sig=103943173353807169362&page=1&tbnh=142&tbnw=189&start=0 &ndsp=25&ved=1t:429,r:6,s:0,i:81

6.  Proxima is about 18,000 times fainter than the sun. http://www.msnucleus.org/m embership/html/jh/earth/star s/lesson1/stars01d.html http://www.msnucleus.org/membership/html/jh/earth/sta rs/lesson1/stars01d.html

7.  The apparent magnitude of Proxima is 11.05. Do you know what apparent magnitude is? Apparent magnitude is its brightness as seen by an observer on Earth. http://space.about.com/od/stars/p /proximacentauri.htm

8. The absolute magnitude of Proxima is about 15.5. That is dimmer compared to the Sun’s…the Sun’s absolute magnitude is 4.83. What is absolute magnitude? Absolute magnitude is also known as the brightness of the stars. http://space.about.com/od/stars/p/proxi macentauri.htm

9.  Proxima is located in the constellation Centaurus http://mail.colonial.net/~hkaiter/starweb080 9/SECTION2/andrewweb2B/andrewweb2.ht ml

11.  Centaurus is a Centaur, they are half man-half horse!  Centaurus faces east because he defending himself against Lupus the goat another constellation nearby!  Centaurus is known as a “myth” constellation.  It’s the 9 th largest constellation in the sky  Proxima is the 3 rd star in Centaurus  Contains 2 of the brightest stars (Alpha Centauri and Beta Centauri)  It contains 11 stars http://mail.colonial.net/~hkaiter/starweb0809/SECTION 2/andrewweb2B/andrewweb2.html

12.  Centaurus is part of the Hercules family  It has its own meteor shower  Found in Northern Hemisphere in the spring Found in the Southern Hemisphere in the autumn

13.  Centaurus was thought by the Greeks to be a head and torso of a man and the body of a horse.  Greek mythology says that Centaurs were the only monsters that could do good deeds.  Also according to the myth, he helped teach people how to read in the sky!  Centaurus constellation has a picture of him in the sky to guide a group of sailors called the "Argonots". This is what the Greeks believed Centaurs looked like. http://mail.colonial.net/~hkaiter/starweb0809/SEC TION2/andrewweb2B/andrewweb2.html

14. http://www.rasnz.org.nz/Stars/Centaurus.htm

15.  Centaurus is never in the sky viewed from middle northern latitudes (around 40 degrees). As you travel south on the Earth's surface and pass below the equator, you will definitely see it from time to time.