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A synodic day (or synodic rotation period or solar day) is the period for a celestial object to rotate once in relation to the star it is orbiting, and is the basis of solar time. The synodic day is distinguished from the sidereal day , which is one complete rotation in relation to distant stars [ 1 ] and is the basis of sidereal time.
Picture of a poster clarifying the difference between a sidereal day and the more conventional solar day Animation showing the difference between a sidereal day and a solar day. Sidereal time ("sidereal" pronounced / s aɪ ˈ d ɪər i əl, s ə-/ sy-DEER-ee-əl, sə-) is a system of timekeeping used especially by astronomers.
27.321661 days [7] (equal to sidereal orbital period due to spin-orbit locking, a sidereal lunar month) 27 d 7 h 43 m 11.5 s: 29.530588 days [7] (equal to synodic orbital period, due to spin-orbit locking, a synodic lunar month) none (due to spin-orbit locking) Mars: 1.02595675 days [3] 1 d 0 h 37 m 22.663 s: 1.02749125 [8] days: Ceres: 0.37809 ...
On a prograde planet like the Earth, the sidereal day is shorter than the solar day. At time 1, the Sun and a certain distant star are both overhead. At time 2, the planet has rotated 360° and the distant star is overhead again (1→2 = one sidereal day). But it is not until a little later, at time 3, that the Sun is overhead again (1→3 = one solar day). More simply, 1→2 is a complete ...
The cosine of the hour angle (cos(h)) is used to calculate the solar zenith angle. At solar noon, h = 0.000 so cos(h) = 1, and before and after solar noon the cos(± h) term = the same value for morning (negative hour angle) or afternoon (positive hour angle), so that the Sun is at the same altitude in the sky at 11:00AM and 1:00PM solar time. [5]
Angles in the hours ( h), minutes ( m), and seconds ( s) of time measure must be converted to decimal degrees or radians before calculations are performed. 1 h = 15°; 1 m = 15′; 1 s = 15″ Angles greater than 360° (2 π ) or less than 0° may need to be reduced to the range 0°−360° (0–2 π ) depending upon the particular calculating ...
The formal lunar day is therefore the time of a full lunar day-night cycle. Due to tidal locking, this equals the time that the Moon takes to complete one synodic orbit around Earth, a synodic lunar month, returning to the same lunar phase. The synodic period is about 29.53 Earth days, which is about 2.2 days longer than its sidereal period.
Curves of Δt and Δt ey along with symbols locating the daily values at noon (at 10-day intervals) obtained from the Multiyear Interactive Computer Almanac vs d (day) for the year 2000 Derivative of −Δt. The axis on the right shows the length of the solar day. Here M D is the value of M at the chosen date and time.