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Epic variable star 65 EP

HR 3541

RA 133.8453° · Dec 17.2313° · star

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Score breakdown

· 8 badges
65 pts · Epic
Epic 78 pts → Anomaly
  • Carbon star (sooty red) +24
  • Bright giant +12
  • Deep red star +8
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) +6
  • Variable star +5
  • Gently variable +4
  • On the zodiac +3
  • A named variable star +3
Total score 65

13 more points to reach Anomaly.

Badges

  • Variable star · +5
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) · +6
  • 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

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads C6II — 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.

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 February — that's when to go looking.

Could we get there?

  • Verdict. Impossible with our current technology — and the next millennium of it.

Properties

absmag
-1.393
bv
2.975
constellation
Cnc
dist ly
1116.9728
luminosity
314.1955
mag
6.28
name
HR 3541
spect
C6II
var amplitude
0.31
var designation
X
var max
6.129
var min
6.439

About HR 3541

HR 3541 is an epic variable star. It lies about 1,117 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Cnc, shines at apparent magnitude 6.28 and has spectral type C6II.

Its spectrum reads C6II — a carbon star, wrapped in so much soot that its light is filtered to a deep ruby red.

How to see it

Look for HR 3541 in the constellation Cnc. At apparent magnitude 6.28, it is an easy target for binoculars.

Like any astronomical target, HR 3541 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 HR 3541 is an epic variable star

HR 3541 scores 65 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the epic tier. Another 13 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 8 science badges — Variable star, Distant (over 1,000 light-years), 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.