The Arches Cluster, with young, massive stars, taken by the NACO on ESO’s Very Large Telescope.
Have you ever heard of a service that lets you buy a star? Maybe you want to name a star after your child, or have a unique memorial for a loved one. There are several services out there that will let you buy a star. But here’s the problem, you’re not actually buying a star name. All these services will do is record the name in their database, send you information about the star, but it’s not official.
Let me give you an example. Imagine I ran a company called “Name a Town”. For a fee of $20, I would let you pick any one of the thousands of towns and cities on Earth and give it whatever name you like. I’ll record that name in my big book of names, and send you a world map with the location of the town that you named with your new name. Unfortunately, the citizens of that town aren’t going to change the name of the town to the name you just gave them.
That’s how it works for stars. The names of astronomical objects are given by the International Astronomical Union. Every two years they meet and agree on the new names for objects, like stars and newly discovered planets. It was at a meeting in 2006 where the IAU decided that Pluto wasn’t a planet any more.
If you do decide that you want to “buy a star”, there are a couple of services out there that you can use. One example is this service, called Adopt a Star. You’re really donating money, and the proceeds will be used to help search for extrasolar planets. Another service lets you name a star for free. Once again, it’s not an official name, but they’ll give you a nice certificate showing you the location of the star.
We have written a more extensive article on the subject. Check out this article, Name a Star, Real or Ripoff.
There’s another good article over at Wired Magazine that explains why you can’t really buy stars.
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