Light travelling in empty space is the fastest thing in the universe. It travels at 186,000 miles per second!
The stars are so far away from us that their light still takes a long time to reach Earth. One light year is the distance light travels in a year: 5,878,499,812,499 miles. The closest star apart from the Sun is 4.2 light years away, so its light takes 4.2 years to reach Earth.
Tell the Birthday Stars computer when you were born, and it will look for a star that is your age in light years away from Earth. This means that the light we're seeing from that star today actually left the star around when you were born, and has taken your entire life to reach Earth.
From month to month you may see your birthday star changing. This is because as you get older the light from more and more distant stars has had the time to travel to Earth in during your life.
Click here to find your birthday starHere's the info on my star:
Your birthday star has the common name Alderamin. It is in the constellation Cepheus. It has the name α (Alpha) Cephei in Johann Bayer's Uranometria star catalog. It is also called 5 Cephei in the Historia Cœlestis Britannica of John Flamsteed and Edmund Halley. It is called NS 2118+6235 in the NStars database.
It has visual magnitude 2.45 meaning that you could see this star easily with the naked eye. It is marked in the center of this star chart, at celestial coordinates (J2000 equinox):
| Right ascension | 21:18:34.8 | |
| Declination | 62:35:8 |
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