Stars close by in a row (sort of)?

Question

For a SF piece I'm using the humans have a shodily run ming colony at Sirus A. (The mining co uses lack of regulations to make a profit.)

The aliens have a colony on Altair.

But I don't know if that is on the other side. I want it close and can change star systems. Oh I need a 4th star system where the aliens started. same problem.

Answer 1

Procyon is within 10 light years of Sirius, of course so are Sol (our sun), Luyten's star, Kapteyn's star, Wolf 359, Alpha and Proxima Centauri...Hope this helps...the link i've included is great for this stuff, you can search for stars within a certain distance of other stars!

Answer 2

Sounds like you'd like to get your hands on a star catalog - those list thousands of stars, along with their brightness, luminosity class (so you can tell if they are a normal star like our Sun or a Red Giant like Betelgeuse, etc), distance, and lots of other stuff. You might be able to find one on line that is searchable (that would probably be ideal for you). I found a page that lists some of the more well known *books* that you might find somewhere:
http://www.seds.org/~spider/spider/Misc/star_cats.html
You might also look for the Astronomical Almanac, which is published every year (you could use any year, you don't need a current one). Among lots of other stuff, it has a star catalog of the brightest stars in the sky (pretty much all the ones that are visible to the naked eye). The Astronomical Almanac might be the easiest to find at your local library.

You can also get a planetarium software called Celestia. It's free and has all sorts of info like what you are looking for. I actually know someone who is also writing some sci fi and using Celestia as a reference.

Answer 3

Also, remember to look at the type of star and remember, the implications of the type of star, how much radiation they give off, heat, light, etc.

Try this program, it's pretty great as a reference...

http://www.nbos.com/products/astro/astro.htm

it lets you keep track of all that kind of stuff, pretty cool...
Good luck!!!

Answer 4

use the cassiopeia constellation