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Epic variable star 53 EP

HD 168625

RA 275.3314° · Dec -16.3739° · star

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Score breakdown

· 8 badges
53 pts · Epic
Epic 78 pts → Anomaly
  • Supergiant +18
  • Toward the galactic centre +8
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) +6
  • Hot blue B-type star +6
  • Variable star +5
  • Gently variable +4
  • On the zodiac +3
  • A named variable star +3
Total score 53

25 more points to reach Anomaly.

Badges

  • Variable star · +5
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) · +6
  • Toward the galactic centre · +8
  • On the zodiac · +3
  • Hot blue B-type star · +6
  • Supergiant · +18
  • Gently variable · +4
  • A named variable star · +3

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads B2/5Ia(e) — a blue-white B-type star, with a surface tens of thousands of degrees hot and a life measured in tens of millions of years.
  • 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 8.4 it is just past naked-eye reach — ordinary binoculars will pull it in, over in Sagittarius.
  • 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 June — that's when to go looking.

Could we get there?

  • Verdict. Impossible with our current technology — and the next millennium of it.

Getting there

  • Aboard Voyager 1. ≈ 22.7 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).

Properties

absmag
0.367
bv
1.227
constellation
Sgr
dist ly
1294.2699
luminosity
62.1155
mag
8.36
name
HD 168625
spect
B2/5Ia(e)
var amplitude
0.15
var designation
V4030
var max
8.304
var min
8.454

About HD 168625

HD 168625 is an epic variable star. It lies about 1,294.3 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Sgr, shines at apparent magnitude 8.36 and has spectral type B2/5Ia(e).

Its spectrum reads B2/5Ia(e) — a blue-white B-type star, with a surface tens of thousands of degrees hot and a life measured in tens of millions of years.

How to see it

Look for HD 168625 in the constellation Sgr. At apparent magnitude 8.36, it is an easy target for binoculars.

Like any astronomical target, HD 168625 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 168625 is an epic variable star

HD 168625 scores 53 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the epic tier. Another 25 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 8 science badges — Variable star, Distant (over 1,000 light-years), Toward the galactic centre, On the zodiac, Hot blue B-type star, Supergiant, Gently 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.