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Common variable star 20 EP

HD 52961

RA 105.9151° · Dec 10.7703° · star

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Score breakdown

· 5 badges
20 pts · Common
Common 22 pts → Uncommon
  • Variable star +5
  • White A-type star +5
  • Gently variable +4
  • On the zodiac +3
  • A named variable star +3
Total score 20

2 more points to reach Uncommon.

Badges

  • Variable star · +5
  • On the zodiac · +3
  • White A-type star · +5
  • Gently variable · +4
  • A named variable star · +3

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads A0 — 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.

Find it in the sky

  • How to spot it. At magnitude 7.4 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 January — that's when to go looking.

Its true colour

  • Its true colour. Measured through blue and visual filters it comes out yellow-white (B−V 0.4) — a shade brighter and crisper than our own Sun.
  • 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 6840 K, against the Sun's 5778 K.

Properties

absmag
-12.61
bv
0.408
constellation
Gem
luminosity
9638290.2362
mag
7.39
name
HD 52961
spect
A0
var amplitude
0.21
var designation
PS
var max
7.266
var min
7.476

About HD 52961

HD 52961 is a common variable star. It sits in the constellation Gem, shines at apparent magnitude 7.39 and has spectral type A0.

Its spectrum reads A0 — 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 52961 in the constellation Gem. At apparent magnitude 7.39, it is an easy target for binoculars.

Like any astronomical target, HD 52961 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 52961 is a common variable star

HD 52961 scores 20 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the common tier. Another 2 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 5 science badges — Variable star, On the zodiac, White A-type 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.