Definition:Colatitude
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Definition
In a spherical coordinate system, the colatitude $\theta$ of a point is the angle between the polar axis and the radius vector.
Celestial Colatitude
Let $P$ be a point on the celestial sphere.
Let the celestial latitude of $P$ be $\beta$.
The celestial colatitude of $P$ is defined as:
- $90 \degrees - \beta$ when $P$ is closer to the north ecliptic pole
- $90 \degrees + \beta$ when $P$ is closer to the south ecliptic pole.
Also see
- Results about colatitude can be found here.
Sources
- 1998: David Nelson: The Penguin Dictionary of Mathematics (2nd ed.) ... (previous) ... (next): colatitude: 1.
- 1998: David Nelson: The Penguin Dictionary of Mathematics (2nd ed.) ... (previous) ... (next): spherical coordinate system
- 2008: David Nelson: The Penguin Dictionary of Mathematics (4th ed.) ... (previous) ... (next): colatitude: 1.
- 2008: David Nelson: The Penguin Dictionary of Mathematics (4th ed.) ... (previous) ... (next): spherical coordinate system