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Common star 19 EP

Meleph

RA 130.1125° · Dec 19.5448° · star

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Score breakdown

· 4 badges
19 pts · Common
Common 22 pts → Uncommon
  • Has a proper name +8
  • White A-type star +5
  • Star +3
  • On the zodiac +3
Total score 19

3 more points to reach Uncommon.

Badges

  • Star · +3
  • Has a proper name · +8
  • On the zodiac · +3
  • White A-type star · +5

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads Am — 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.

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 6.3 it is just past naked-eye reach — ordinary binoculars will pull it in, over in Cancer.
  • 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.

Could we get there?

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

Getting there

  • Aboard Voyager 1. ≈ 10.3 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).
  • Fastest probe ever. ≈ 915.9 thousand years even at the Parker Solar Probe's 192 km/s.

Properties

absmag
0.015
bv
0.17
constellation
Cnc
dist ly
586.6115
luminosity
85.9014
mag
6.29
name
Meleph
named
yes
spect
Am

About Meleph

Meleph is a common star. It lies about 586.6 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Cnc, shines at apparent magnitude 6.29 and has spectral type Am.

Its spectrum reads Am — 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 Meleph in the constellation Cnc. At apparent magnitude 6.29, it is an easy target for binoculars.

Like any astronomical target, Meleph 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 Meleph is a common star

Meleph scores 19 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the common tier. Another 3 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 4 science badges — Star, Has a proper name, On the zodiac and White A-type 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.