Cancer the Crab

constellation · zodiac · stars · space

A Celestial Crab. Cancer is one of the twelve zodiac constellations, and its name is the Latin word for crab. Ancient astronomers imagined the stars in this region formed the shape of a sideways crab in the night sky.

Faint but Real. Cancer is medium-sized but its stars are quite dim compared to other constellations. Its brightest star, Beta Cancri, is still pretty faint at magnitude 3.5, which means you need a dark sky away from city lights to see it clearly.

Alien Worlds Galore. Cancer contains ten stars that we know have planets orbiting them. One star called 69 Cancri has five planets, including a super-Earth and four giant worlds, and one of those planets might have temperatures just right for life like Earth's.

Starry Nursery. At the heart of Cancer lies Praesepe, an open cluster of stars that is one of the closest star clusters to Earth. Praesepe looks like a tiny fuzzy cloud to the naked eye but through a telescope you can see dozens of beautiful young stars crowded together.