The Heart of the Lion

10 P.M. A bright yellow "star" shines in the east. This is the planet Saturn. Just to the west of is shines a bright star, slightly dimmer than Saturn. This is Regulus, the heart of Leo, the Lion, the first bright star of Spring.

Orion and the stars of winter move to the west, leaving us for another year. The stars of spring begin to appear in the east.

Most of the groupings of stars we call constellations have been seen differently in other lands and at other times; even the stars themselves have been grouped differently. But all men and women have seen a lion in these first stars of spring.

Above Regulus is the "question mark," or backwards sickle that represents his mane. His hindquarters are to the east. He is like a great cat, looking westward at Orion.

Regulus is spinning much faster than the Sun and even faster than the Earth. The Sun rotates once a month: this means that a point on its equator travels four thousand miles an hour. Regulus, a star many times as big as the Sun, rotates in only sixteen hours. A point on its equator travels seven hundred thousand miles an hour. Any faster and the star would be ripped apart.

The result of this rapid spinning is that the star flattens out, and is a third wider than it is high. If there were any people living on a planet circling Regulus, they would look up and see, not a circular sun, but an oval

Therešs more: the axis of rotation of this star is in the direction of its motion away from us. Regulus is like a spinning bullet, speeding through space at almost ten thousand miles an hour.

Keep looking up!

(02/13/08)