right ascension

1. 1.

   (astronomy) the equatorial coordinate specifying the angle, measured eastward along the celestial equator, from the vernal equinox to the intersection of the hour circle that passes through an object in the sky; usually expressed in hours and minutes and seconds; used with declination to specify positions on the celestial sphere

   “one hour of right ascension equals fifteen degrees”

   SynonymsRAcelestial longitude

   Broaderangular distance

   astronomy

Questions about right ascension

What does right ascension mean?

right ascension means "(astronomy) the equatorial coordinate specifying the angle, measured eastward along the celestial equator, from the vernal equinox to the intersection of the hour circle that passes through an object in the sky; usually expressed in hours and minutes and seconds; used with declination to specify positions on the celestial sphere".

What is another word for right ascension?

Close synonyms include RA, celestial longitude. Each sense on this page lists its own synonyms, because a word with several meanings rarely has one substitute that works for all of them.

Is right ascension a common word?

right ascension is banded "Rare" — specialist or archaic — most readers will not have met it. The band comes from how often the word appears in a large corpus of everyday English, not from an editor's impression.