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The solar rotation can be seen in the background of this false color video. Solar rotation varies with latitude. The Sun is not a solid body, but is composed of a gaseous plasma. Different latitudes rotate at different periods. The source of this differential rotation is an area of current research in solar astronomy. [1]
The two most commonly used systems are the Stonyhurst and Carrington systems. They both define latitude as the angular distance from the solar equator, but differ in how they define longitude. In Stonyhurst coordinates, the longitude is fixed for an observer on Earth, and, in Carrington coordinates, the longitude is fixed for the Sun's rotation.
Earth's rotation about its axis causes diurnal motion, so that the Sun appears to move across the sky in a Sun path that depends on the observer's geographic latitude. The time when the Sun transits the observer's meridian depends on the geographic longitude.
Solar longitude, commonly abbreviated as Ls, is the ecliptic longitude of the Sun, i.e. the position of the Sun on the celestial sphere along the ecliptic.It is also an effective measure of the position of the Earth (or any other Sun-orbiting body) in its orbit around the Sun, [1] usually taken as zero at the moment of the vernal equinox. [2]
Ecliptic latitude or celestial latitude (symbols: heliocentric b, geocentric β), measures the angular distance of an object from the ecliptic towards the north (positive) or south (negative) ecliptic pole. For example, the north ecliptic pole has a celestial latitude of +90°. Ecliptic latitude for "fixed stars" is not affected by precession ...
The times of sunset and sunrise vary with the observer's location (longitude and latitude), so the dates when day and night are equal also depend upon the observer's location. A third correction for the visual observation of a sunrise (or sunset) is the angle between the apparent horizon as seen by an observer and the geometric (or sensible ...
It is the complement to the solar altitude or solar elevation, which is the altitude angle or elevation angle between the sun’s rays and a horizontal plane. [4] [5] At solar noon, the zenith angle is at a minimum and is equal to latitude minus solar declination angle. This is the basis by which ancient mariners navigated the oceans. [6]
The Solar System is still the center of the coordinate system, and the zero point is defined as the direction towards the Galactic Center. Galactic latitude resembles the elevation above the galactic plane and galactic longitude determines direction relative to the center of the galaxy.