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Epic variable star 59 EP

HD 47883

RA 100.5358° · Dec 31.4549° · star

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Score breakdown

· 7 badges
59 pts · Epic
Epic 78 pts → Anomaly
  • Carbon star (sooty red) +24
  • Bright giant +12
  • Deep red star +8
  • Variable star +5
  • Gently variable +4
  • On the zodiac +3
  • A named variable star +3
Total score 59

19 more points to reach Anomaly.

Badges

  • Variable star · +5
  • On the zodiac · +3
  • Carbon star (sooty red) · +24
  • Bright giant · +12
  • Deep red star · +8
  • Gently variable · +4
  • A named variable star · +3

Trivia

Hard to believe

  • True brightness. It pours out about 4.4 million times as much light as the Sun. It only looks ordinary because it is so far away.

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads C5II — a carbon star, wrapped in so much soot that its light is filtered to a deep ruby red.
  • Where it is in life. It is a bright giant, well on its way to the largest stars there are.
  • 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.

Find it in the sky

  • How to spot it. At magnitude 8.2 it is just past naked-eye reach — ordinary binoculars will pull it in, over in Gemini.
  • 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 deep orange-red (B−V 2.4) — one of the coolest surfaces a star can have while still fusing.

Properties

absmag
-11.77
bv
2.42
constellation
Gem
luminosity
4446312.6747
mag
8.23
name
HD 47883
spect
C5II
var amplitude
0.28
var designation
VW
var max
8.075
var min
8.355

About HD 47883

HD 47883 is an epic variable star. It sits in the constellation Gem, shines at apparent magnitude 8.23 and has spectral type C5II.

Its spectrum reads C5II — a carbon star, wrapped in so much soot that its light is filtered to a deep ruby red.

How to see it

Look for HD 47883 in the constellation Gem. At apparent magnitude 8.23, it is an easy target for binoculars.

Like any astronomical target, HD 47883 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 47883 is an epic variable star

HD 47883 scores 59 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the epic tier. Another 19 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 7 science badges — Variable star, On the zodiac, Carbon star (sooty red), Bright giant, Deep red 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.