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Epic variable star 56 EP

Cih

RA 14.1771° · Dec 60.7167° · star

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Score breakdown

· 10 badges
56 pts · Epic
Epic 78 pts → Anomaly
  • Intrinsically luminous (Mv < −2) +10
  • Naked-eye visible +8
  • Has a proper name +8
  • Hot blue B-type star +6
  • Variable star +5
  • Subgiant (leaving the main sequence) +5
  • Blue-white star +5
  • Never sets (northern circumpolar) +4
  • A named variable star +3
  • Barely variable (under 0.05 mag) +2
Total score 56

22 more points to reach Anomaly.

Badges

  • Variable star · +5
  • Naked-eye visible · +8
  • Has a proper name · +8
  • Never sets (northern circumpolar) · +4
  • Hot blue B-type star · +6
  • Subgiant (leaving the main sequence) · +5
  • Blue-white star · +5
  • Intrinsically luminous (Mv < −2) · +10
  • Barely variable (under 0.05 mag) · +2
  • A named variable star · +3

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads B0IV:evar — 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.
  • Where it is in life. It is a subgiant, caught in the act of leaving the main sequence as the hydrogen in its core runs out.
  • 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 2.1 you can see it with your own eyes from a dark site, over in Cassiopeia.
  • Never sets. So far north that from Britain, Canada or northern Europe it never dips below the horizon — it is up every clear night of the year.
  • Best time of year. It stands highest in the middle of the night around October — that's when to go looking.

Could we get there?

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

Properties

absmag
-3.981
bv
-0.046
constellation
Cas
dist ly
549.0843
luminosity
3407.2186
mag
2.15
name
Cih
named
yes
spect
B0IV:evar
var amplitude
0.04
var designation
Gam
var max
2.133
var min
2.173

About Cih

Cih is an epic variable star. It lies about 549.1 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Cas, shines at apparent magnitude 2.15 and has spectral type B0IV:evar.

Its spectrum reads B0IV:evar — 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 Cih in the constellation Cas. At apparent magnitude 2.15, it can be glimpsed with the unaided eye under dark skies.

Like any astronomical target, Cih 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 Cih is an epic variable star

Cih scores 56 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the epic tier. Another 22 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 10 science badges — Variable star, Naked-eye visible, Has a proper name, Never sets (northern circumpolar), Hot blue B-type star, Subgiant (leaving the main sequence), Blue-white star and Intrinsically luminous (Mv < −2) — 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.