Olympiad Test: Beyond Earth - 1 - Class 6 MCQ

In Ladakh, the air is clean, and there is little light pollution. This means artificial lights and smog don’t block the natural light from stars, making the night sky clearer and full of stars.

Constellations are groups of stars that appear to form shapes or patterns in the sky, like Orion (a hunter) or Ursa Major (the Big Dipper). People connected these stars with imaginary lines to make the patterns easier to recognise.

Before compasses and GPS, sailors used stars like the Pole Star and constellations for navigation to find direction during long journeys on land and sea.

Orion is a famous constellation that looks like a hunter. Its three stars in a straight line are called Orion’s Belt, easily visible in the night sky.

To organise the sky systematically, the IAU divided it into 88 official constellations. Each constellation marks a region of the sky.

The Pole Star (Dhruva Tara) is fixed above the Earth’s axis and always points North. That’s why travellers and sailors used it to find direction.

Streetlights, city lights, and artificial lighting brighten the sky and hide the stars. This is called light pollution and is common in big cities.

Dark sky reserves are special areas where artificial lighting is reduced so that people can enjoy stargazing and scientists can study the night sky better.

Apps like Sky Map and Stellarium help people locate constellations and planets in real time by pointing their phone towards the sky.

The Sun is our closest star, located about 150 million km away. All other stars are much farther, which is why they look small.