About HD 130398
HD 130398 is a common star. It sits in the constellation Lib, shines at apparent magnitude 8.82 and has spectral type G8/K0III/IV.
Its spectrum reads G8/K0III/IV — a G-type star: the very same spectral class as our own Sun.
Common star 20 EP
HD 130398
RA 222.1058° · Dec -15.2268° · star
Score breakdown
· 4 badgesCommon 22 pts → Uncommon
- Sun-like G-type star +8
- Giant star +6
- Star +3
- On the zodiac +3
Total score 20
2 more points to reach Uncommon.
Badges
- Star · +3
- On the zodiac · +3
- Sun-like G-type star · +8
- Giant star · +6
Trivia
Hard to believe
- True brightness. It pours out about 2.5 million times as much light as the Sun. It only looks ordinary because it is so far away.
What it actually is
- Spectral class. Its spectrum reads G8/K0III/IV — a G-type star: the very same spectral class as our own Sun.
Find it in the sky
- How to spot it. At magnitude 8.8 it is just past naked-eye reach — ordinary binoculars will pull it in, over in Libra.
- Southern sky. It rides the southern half of the sky — an easier target the further south you are.
- Best time of year. It stands highest in the middle of the night around May — that's when to go looking.
Its true colour
- Its true colour. Measured through blue and visual filters it comes out orange (B−V 1) — cooler than the Sun, and the kind of star that burns steadily for tens of billions of years.
By the numbers
- Surface temperature. Its colour puts the surface at roughly 4720 K, against the Sun's 5778 K.
What's in a name
- Its catalogue. The HD number is from the Henry Draper Catalogue, in which Annie Jump Cannon personally classified the spectra of nearly 400,000 stars — still the largest such feat by one person.
Properties
- absmag
- -11.18
- bv
- 1.008
- constellation
- Lib
- luminosity
- 2582260.1906
- mag
- 8.82
- name
- HD 130398
- spect
- G8/K0III/IV
How to see it
Look for HD 130398 in the constellation Lib. At apparent magnitude 8.82, it is an easy target for binoculars.
Like any astronomical target, HD 130398 is best seen from a dark site away from city lights, and when it is above the horizon depends on your latitude and the time of year. The visibility panel above works out tonight's viewing window for your saved location.
Why HD 130398 is a common star
HD 130398 scores 20 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the common tier. Another 2 points would lift it into a rarer tier.
That score comes from 4 science badges — Star, On the zodiac, Sun-like G-type star and Giant star — each earned for a real, measurable property of the object. Rarity on Spacedle is never random: the more remarkable an object's astrophysics, the more badges it collects, the higher it scores, and the rarer it ranks.