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Uncommon variable star 23 EP

52 Her

RA 252.3092° · Dec 45.9833° · star

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Score breakdown

· 5 badges
23 pts · Uncommon
Uncommon 34 pts → Rare
  • Naked-eye visible +8
  • Variable star +5
  • White A-type star +5
  • A named variable star +3
  • Barely variable (under 0.05 mag) +2
Total score 23

11 more points to reach Rare.

Badges

  • Variable star · +5
  • Naked-eye visible · +8
  • White A-type star · +5
  • Barely variable (under 0.05 mag) · +2
  • A named variable star · +3

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads A2p... — an A-type star: white-hot, typically about twice the Sun's mass, and the class most of the sky's famous bright stars belong to.
  • 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 4.8 you can see it with your own eyes from a dark site, 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 June — that's when to go looking.

Could we get there?

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

Getting there

  • Aboard Voyager 1. ≈ 3.2 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).

Properties

absmag
1.108
bv
0.087
constellation
Her
dist ly
180.1966
luminosity
31.3906
mag
4.82
name
52 Her
spect
A2p...
var amplitude
0.02
var designation
V637
var max
4.811
var min
4.831

About 52 Her

52 Her is an uncommon variable star. It lies about 180.2 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Her, shines at apparent magnitude 4.82 and has spectral type A2p....

Its spectrum reads A2p... — an A-type star: white-hot, typically about twice the Sun's mass, and the class most of the sky's famous bright stars belong to.

How to see it

Look for 52 Her in the constellation Her. At apparent magnitude 4.82, it can be glimpsed with the unaided eye under dark skies.

Like any astronomical target, 52 Her 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 52 Her is an uncommon variable star

52 Her scores 23 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the uncommon tier. Another 11 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 5 science badges — Variable star, Naked-eye visible, White A-type star, Barely variable (under 0.05 mag) 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.