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Common variable star 19 EP

HD 37909

RA 81.7074° · Dec -81.5853° · star

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Score breakdown

· 5 badges
19 pts · Common
Common 22 pts → Uncommon
  • Variable star +5
  • White A-type star +5
  • Gently variable +4
  • A named variable star +3
  • Main-sequence star +2
Total score 19

3 more points to reach Uncommon.

Badges

  • Variable star · +5
  • White A-type star · +5
  • Main-sequence star · +2
  • Gently variable · +4
  • A named variable star · +3

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads A3/A4V — 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 8.3 it is just past naked-eye reach — ordinary binoculars will pull it in, over in Mensa.
  • Southern sky only. So far south it never rises for most of the northern hemisphere. To see it you'd have to travel to Chile, South Africa or Australia.
  • Best time of year. It stands highest in the middle of the night around December — 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. ≈ 10 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).

Properties

absmag
2.061
bv
0.254
constellation
Men
dist ly
569.2078
luminosity
13.0497
mag
8.27
name
HD 37909
spect
A3/A4V
var amplitude
0.44
var designation
TY
var max
8.131
var min
8.571

About HD 37909

HD 37909 is a common variable star. It lies about 569.2 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Men, shines at apparent magnitude 8.27 and has spectral type A3/A4V.

Its spectrum reads A3/A4V — 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 HD 37909 in the constellation Men. At apparent magnitude 8.27, it is an easy target for binoculars.

Like any astronomical target, HD 37909 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 37909 is a common variable star

HD 37909 scores 19 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the common tier. Another 3 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 5 science badges — Variable star, White A-type star, Main-sequence star, 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.