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Epic variable star 58 EP

Tianguan

RA 84.4112° · Dec 21.1425° · star

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Score breakdown

· 10 badges
58 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
  • Giant star +6
  • Variable star +5
  • Blue-white star +5
  • Gently variable +4
  • On the zodiac +3
  • A named variable star +3
Total score 58

20 more points to reach Anomaly.

Badges

  • Variable star · +5
  • Naked-eye visible · +8
  • Has a proper name · +8
  • On the zodiac · +3
  • Hot blue B-type star · +6
  • Giant star · +6
  • Blue-white star · +5
  • Intrinsically luminous (Mv < −2) · +10
  • Gently variable · +4
  • A named variable star · +3

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads B4IIIp — 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 giant. It has already exhausted its core hydrogen and swollen up enormously in response.
  • 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 3 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 December — that's when to go looking.

Could we get there?

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

Properties

absmag
-2.704
bv
-0.148
constellation
Tau
dist ly
444.9603
luminosity
1050.9934
mag
2.97
name
Tianguan
named
yes
spect
B4IIIp
var amplitude
0.13
var designation
Zet
var max
2.902
var min
3.032

About Tianguan

Tianguan is an epic variable star. It lies about 445 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Tau, shines at apparent magnitude 2.97 and has spectral type B4IIIp.

Its spectrum reads B4IIIp — 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 Tianguan in the constellation Tau. At apparent magnitude 2.97, it can be glimpsed with the unaided eye under dark skies.

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

Tianguan scores 58 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the epic tier. Another 20 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 10 science badges — Variable star, Naked-eye visible, Has a proper name, On the zodiac, Hot blue B-type star, Giant star, 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.