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Uncommon variable star 27 EP

HIP 80903

RA 247.8248° · Dec 11.9979° · star

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Score breakdown

· 5 badges
27 pts · Uncommon
Uncommon 34 pts → Rare
  • Strongly variable +10
  • Giant star +6
  • Variable star +5
  • Yellow-white F-type star +3
  • A named variable star +3
Total score 27

7 more points to reach Rare.

Badges

  • Variable star · +5
  • Yellow-white F-type star · +3
  • Giant star · +6
  • Strongly variable · +10
  • A named variable star · +3

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads F4IIIvar — an F-type star — a little hotter, whiter and shorter-lived than the Sun.
  • Where it is in life. It is a giant. It has already exhausted its core hydrogen and swollen up enormously in response.
  • It changes. This star does not hold still: its brightness rises and falls on a rhythm of hours, days or years, either pulsing in size or being eclipsed by a companion.

Sense of scale

  • In perspective. Far away by human standards, yet still a local address inside the Milky Way's spiral arms.

Find it in the sky

  • How to spot it. At magnitude 10.5 you'll want a small backyard telescope, over in Hercules.
  • Northern sky. It rides the northern half of the sky — an easier target the further north you are.
  • Best time of year. It stands highest in the middle of the night around May — that's when to go looking.

Could we get there?

  • Verdict. Hopelessly far for any craft humanity can build today.

Properties

absmag
4.17
bv
0.339
constellation
Her
dist ly
607.3667
luminosity
1.8707
mag
10.52
name
HIP 80903
spect
F4IIIvar
var amplitude
0.53
var designation
DY
var max
10.182
var min
10.712

About HIP 80903

HIP 80903 is an uncommon variable star. It lies about 607.4 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Her, shines at apparent magnitude 10.52 and has spectral type F4IIIvar.

Its spectrum reads F4IIIvar — an F-type star — a little hotter, whiter and shorter-lived than the Sun.

How to see it

Look for HIP 80903 in the constellation Her. At apparent magnitude 10.52, a small backyard telescope will bring it into view.

Like any astronomical target, HIP 80903 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 HIP 80903 is an uncommon variable star

HIP 80903 scores 27 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the uncommon tier. Another 7 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 5 science badges — Variable star, Yellow-white F-type star, Giant star, Strongly variable and A named variable 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.