An experiment to observe "Beta Pictoris", the second brightest star in the Pictor constellation has been undertaken by astronomers. The observation will take place at the SA Astronomical Observatory at Sutherland, Northern Cape for a dedicated period of 200 days, starting from April 2017 up to January 2018. It will be done by a small robotic all-sky monitor named "B Ring" with two camera systems.
According to the Scientific American, the experiment to look at the "Beta Pictoris" for thousands of hours has been undertaken to see the shadows of rings around another world. Recently, astronomers have detected that a large number of exoplanets relying on the light of stars, which dim by a small amount when the exoplanet's orbit brings it near the star. This technique has been successful in detecting hundreds of exoplanets from the ground and a thousand more from the Kepler space satellite.
"Beta Pictoris", the star that has been picked for the experiment, is viewed in the Southern Hemisphere visible to the naked eye. It is a relatively young star with a large disk of dust and gas around it. A large gas giant planet named "Beta Pic B" takes almost 20 years to complete one around the "Beta Pictoris". "Beta Pic B" is one of the directly imaged exoplanets from Earth. The largest telescopes around the world have taken many pictures of the exoplanet as it revolves around the "Beta Pictoris".
According to the South African Astronomical Observatory, the images captured by the cameras on "B Ring" will be analyzed and used to monitor any changes in the brightness of "Beta Pictoris". If any change is detected, it will induce observations using more sophisticated cameras and instruments to study the ring system closely. The "B Ring" will also provide data regarding the southern sky and the conditions of the night sky, which will be used for further research work.
The "B Ring" project is funded, installed, designed and constructed by the help of NWO (Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research) and NRF (National Research Foundation). Later in the year, a second installation will be done in Australia by the astronomers of Rochester University.
Currently "Beta Pic B" is moving closer to the star, though some researchers have said that it will not transit its parent star this year. This has made it even more worth watching and the phenomenon more intriguing for the observing astronomers.
