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Rare variable star 37 EP

Ruchbah

RA 21.4532° · Dec 60.2353° · star

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Score breakdown

· 8 badges
37 pts · Rare
Rare 50 pts → Epic
  • Naked-eye visible +8
  • Has a proper name +8
  • Variable star +5
  • White A-type star +5
  • Never sets (northern circumpolar) +4
  • A named variable star +3
  • Main-sequence star +2
  • Barely variable (under 0.05 mag) +2
Total score 37

13 more points to reach Epic.

Badges

  • Variable star · +5
  • Naked-eye visible · +8
  • Has a proper name · +8
  • Never sets (northern circumpolar) · +4
  • White A-type star · +5
  • Main-sequence star · +2
  • Barely variable (under 0.05 mag) · +2
  • A named variable star · +3

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads A5Vv SB — 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.
  • Where it is in life. It is on the main sequence, quietly fusing hydrogen in its core exactly as the Sun does.
  • 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. Inside our stellar backyard: every radio broadcast humanity has ever made has already swept past it.

Find it in the sky

  • How to spot it. At magnitude 2.7 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
0.24
bv
0.16
constellation
Cas
dist ly
99.4075
luminosity
69.8232
mag
2.66
name
Ruchbah
named
yes
spect
A5Vv SB
var amplitude
0.01
var designation
Del
var max
2.656
var min
2.666

About Ruchbah

Ruchbah is a rare variable star. It lies about 99.4 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Cas, shines at apparent magnitude 2.66 and has spectral type A5Vv SB.

Its spectrum reads A5Vv SB — 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 Ruchbah in the constellation Cas. At apparent magnitude 2.66, it can be glimpsed with the unaided eye under dark skies.

Like any astronomical target, Ruchbah 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 Ruchbah is a rare variable star

Ruchbah scores 37 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the rare tier. Another 13 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 8 science badges — Variable star, Naked-eye visible, Has a proper name, Never sets (northern circumpolar), White A-type star, Main-sequence 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.