A prominent set of stars in the winter sky
Orion is a prominent set of stars visible during winter in the northern celestial hemisphere. It is one of the 88 modern constellations and was among the 48 constellations listed by the 2nd-century astronomer Ptolemy. The constellation is named for a hunter in Greek mythology.
Orion’s two brightest stars, Rigel (β) and Betelgeuse (α), are both among the brightest stars in the night sky; both are supergiants and slightly variable. There are a further six stars brighter than magnitude 3.0, including three making the short straight line of the Orion’s Belt asterism.
The constellation also hosts the Orion Nebula, one of the brightest nebulae in the sky. Barnard’s Loop can be seen on very dark nights or using long-exposure photography. All of these nebulae are part of the larger Orion molecular cloud complex, which is located approximately 1,500 light-years away and is hundreds of light-years across. It is one of the most intense regions of stellar formation visible within our galaxy.
This summary has been taken and adapted from wikipedia. The content is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.