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Common star 16 EP

38 LMi

RA 159.7819° · Dec 37.9100° · star

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Score breakdown

· 4 badges
16 pts · Common
Common 22 pts → Uncommon
  • Naked-eye visible +8
  • Star +3
  • Yellow-white F-type star +3
  • Main-sequence star +2
Total score 16

6 more points to reach Uncommon.

Badges

  • Star · +3
  • Naked-eye visible · +8
  • Yellow-white F-type star · +3
  • Main-sequence star · +2

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads F9V — an F-type star — a little hotter, whiter and shorter-lived than the Sun.
  • Where it is in life. It is on the main sequence, quietly fusing hydrogen in its core exactly as the Sun does.

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 5.8 you can see it with your own eyes from a dark site, over in Leo Minor.
  • 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 March — 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. ≈ 3 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).

Properties

absmag
2.246
bv
0.595
constellation
LMi
dist ly
170.6729
luminosity
11.0053
mag
5.84
name
38 LMi
spect
F9V

About 38 LMi

38 LMi is a common star. It lies about 170.7 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation LMi, shines at apparent magnitude 5.84 and has spectral type F9V.

Its spectrum reads F9V — an F-type star — a little hotter, whiter and shorter-lived than the Sun.

How to see it

Look for 38 LMi in the constellation LMi. At apparent magnitude 5.84, it can be glimpsed with the unaided eye under dark skies.

Like any astronomical target, 38 LMi 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 38 LMi is a common star

38 LMi scores 16 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the common tier. Another 6 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 4 science badges — Star, Naked-eye visible, Yellow-white F-type star and Main-sequence 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.