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Uncommon star 26 EP

HD 55036

RA 107.7938° · Dec -4.7033° · star

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Score breakdown

· 3 badges
26 pts · Uncommon
Uncommon 34 pts → Rare
  • Supergiant +18
  • White A-type star +5
  • Star +3
Total score 26

8 more points to reach Rare.

Badges

  • Star · +3
  • White A-type star · +5
  • Supergiant · +18

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads A3Ib — 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.
  • Where it is in life. It is a supergiant, hundreds of times wider than the Sun.

Find it in the sky

  • How to spot it. At magnitude 7 it is just past naked-eye reach — ordinary binoculars will pull it in, over in Monoceros.
  • Seen from everywhere. It sits almost on the celestial equator, so it can be seen from essentially anywhere on Earth.
  • 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 brilliant white (B−V 0.3) — 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 7550 K, against the Sun's 5778 K.

Properties

absmag
-12.98
bv
0.287
constellation
Mon
luminosity
13551894.1235
mag
7.02
name
HD 55036
spect
A3Ib

About HD 55036

HD 55036 is an uncommon star. It sits in the constellation Mon, shines at apparent magnitude 7.02 and has spectral type A3Ib.

Its spectrum reads A3Ib — 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 55036 in the constellation Mon. At apparent magnitude 7.02, it is an easy target for binoculars.

Like any astronomical target, HD 55036 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 55036 is an uncommon star

HD 55036 scores 26 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the uncommon tier. Another 8 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 3 science badges — Star, White A-type star and Supergiant — 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.