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Uncommon variable star 32 EP

137 Tau

RA 88.0929° · Dec 14.1718° · star

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Score breakdown

· 7 badges
32 pts · Uncommon
Uncommon 34 pts → Rare
  • Naked-eye visible +8
  • Hot blue B-type star +6
  • Variable star +5
  • Blue-white star +5
  • On the zodiac +3
  • A named variable star +3
  • Barely variable (under 0.05 mag) +2
Total score 32

2 more points to reach Rare.

Badges

  • Variable star · +5
  • Naked-eye visible · +8
  • On the zodiac · +3
  • Hot blue B-type star · +6
  • Blue-white star · +5
  • Barely variable (under 0.05 mag) · +2
  • A named variable star · +3

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads B9p... — 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.
  • 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 5.6 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.

Getting there

  • Aboard Voyager 1. ≈ 7.5 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).

Properties

absmag
0.03
bv
-0.053
constellation
Tau
dist ly
424.13
luminosity
84.7227
mag
5.6
name
137 Tau
spect
B9p...
var amplitude
0.01
var designation
V809
var max
5.595
var min
5.605

About 137 Tau

137 Tau is an uncommon variable star. It lies about 424.1 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Tau, shines at apparent magnitude 5.6 and has spectral type B9p....

Its spectrum reads B9p... — 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 137 Tau in the constellation Tau. At apparent magnitude 5.6, it can be glimpsed with the unaided eye under dark skies.

Like any astronomical target, 137 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 137 Tau is an uncommon variable star

137 Tau scores 32 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the uncommon tier. Another 2 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 7 science badges — Variable star, Naked-eye visible, On the zodiac, Hot blue B-type star, Blue-white 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.