Concept in Definition ABC

The concept that concerns us below is used in a way excluding in the field of astronomy to name the movement that runs the planet earth around the sun, popularly known as translation and that lasts for one calendar year. This movement precisely generates a plane that is called ecliptic. As a consequence, the axis of rotation of the earth has an average inclination between 22 ° and 27 °, both the terrestrial equator and the ecliptic form the same angle with each other.

During its journey around the sun, the earth will maintain this inclination in the same direction and as As a result of the various incidences of the solar light beam on the earth, the stations will be generated (summer, spring, fall and winter).

Cause of the beginning of the seasons of the year

The ecliptic intersects at the equator with two opposite points that we call equinoxes. When the sun appears at the equinox, the duration of the day and night will be twelve hours and the same throughout the planet. The point of the ecliptic, which is further north in relation to the Equator, is called the summer solstice at the behest of the northern hemisphere and the winter solstice in the southern hemisphere.

Meanwhile, the absence of perpendicularity that exists between the axis of rotation of the planet and the plane of the ecliptic is the cause of the beginning of each climatic season.

Incidence in Eclipses

We must also highlight the incidence of the ecliptic at the time of the event of a eclipse because the orbit of the moon is inclined by about 5 ° with respect to the ecliptic, then, during the new moon or the full moon if the same crosses to the ecliptic, the phenomena of the eclipse of the sun and moon will occur, which attract both scholars of the subject and fans of course.

The origin of its name is found in antiquity where the line that was generated in the sky when eclipses occurred was called that way, while this He drew it coincided with the line of the annual path of the sun.

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Themes in Ecliptic