Question

A star with a parallax angle of 0.39" (arcsecond) is what distance away? Give your answer in units of parsecs.

Answer 1

Answer:

2.56 parsec

Explanation:

Parallax angle is the angle subtended by Earth over a gap of 6 months in its orbital path around the Sun with respect to a star. It can be used to measure the distance to the star.

$d (parsec)=\frac{1}{p (arcsecond)}$

Given: p = 0.39"

Substitute the value:

$d =\frac{1}{0.39"}=2.56$ parsec