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Rare star 38 EP

HD 36879

RA 83.9189° · Dec 21.4033° · star

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Score breakdown

· 4 badges
38 pts · Rare
Rare 50 pts → Epic
  • Blazing O-type star +26
  • Giant star +6
  • Star +3
  • On the zodiac +3
Total score 38

12 more points to reach Epic.

Badges

  • Star · +3
  • On the zodiac · +3
  • Blazing O-type star · +26
  • Giant star · +6

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads O7.5III — an O-type star — the hottest, rarest main class there is. Fewer than one star in a million is an O, and none of them lasts long.
  • Where it is in life. It is a giant. It has already exhausted its core hydrogen and swollen up enormously in response.

Find it in the sky

  • How to spot it. At magnitude 7.6 it is just past naked-eye reach — ordinary binoculars will pull it in, 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 December — that's when to go looking.

Its true colour

  • Its true colour. Measured through blue and visual filters it comes out brilliant white (B−V 0.1) — hotter and whiter than the Sun, the colour of Sirius or Vega.
  • Why no green stars. No star ever looks green: a surface hot enough to peak in green also floods out plenty of red and blue, and your eye blends the mixture back to white.

By the numbers

  • Surface temperature. Its colour puts the surface at roughly 8720 K, against the Sun's 5778 K.

Properties

absmag
-12.44
bv
0.133
constellation
Tau
luminosity
8241381.1501
mag
7.56
name
HD 36879
spect
O7.5III

About HD 36879

HD 36879 is a rare star. It sits in the constellation Tau, shines at apparent magnitude 7.56 and has spectral type O7.5III.

Its spectrum reads O7.5III — an O-type star — the hottest, rarest main class there is. Fewer than one star in a million is an O, and none of them lasts long.

How to see it

Look for HD 36879 in the constellation Tau. At apparent magnitude 7.56, it is an easy target for binoculars.

Like any astronomical target, HD 36879 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 36879 is a rare star

HD 36879 scores 38 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the rare tier. Another 12 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 4 science badges — Star, On the zodiac, Blazing O-type star and Giant 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.