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Rare star 44 EP

36 Tau

RA 61.0903° · Dec 24.1060° · star

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Score breakdown

· 7 badges
44 pts · Rare
Rare 50 pts → Epic
  • Intrinsically luminous (Mv < −2) +10
  • Naked-eye visible +8
  • Sun-like G-type star +8
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) +6
  • Giant star +6
  • Star +3
  • On the zodiac +3
Total score 44

6 more points to reach Epic.

Badges

  • Star · +3
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) · +6
  • Naked-eye visible · +8
  • On the zodiac · +3
  • Sun-like G-type star · +8
  • Giant star · +6
  • Intrinsically luminous (Mv < −2) · +10

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads G0III... — a G-type star: the very same spectral class as our own Sun.
  • Where it is in life. It is a giant. It has already exhausted its core hydrogen and swollen up enormously in response.

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 5.5 you can see it with your own eyes from a dark site, over in Taurus.
  • 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 November — 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. ≈ 19.9 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).

Properties

absmag
-2.243
bv
0.813
constellation
Tau
dist ly
1132.486
luminosity
687.3849
mag
5.46
name
36 Tau
spect
G0III...

About 36 Tau

36 Tau is a rare star. It lies about 1,132.5 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Tau, shines at apparent magnitude 5.46 and has spectral type G0III....

Its spectrum reads G0III... — a G-type star: the very same spectral class as our own Sun.

How to see it

Look for 36 Tau in the constellation Tau. At apparent magnitude 5.46, it can be glimpsed with the unaided eye under dark skies.

Like any astronomical target, 36 Tau 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 36 Tau is a rare star

36 Tau scores 44 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the rare tier. Another 6 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 7 science badges — Star, Distant (over 1,000 light-years), Naked-eye visible, On the zodiac, Sun-like G-type star, Giant 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.