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Rare variable star 34 EP

HR 4492

RA 174.8734° · Dec -65.3978° · star

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Score breakdown

· 6 badges
34 pts · Rare
Rare 50 pts → Epic
  • Naked-eye visible +8
  • Sun-like G-type star +8
  • Giant star +6
  • Variable star +5
  • Gently variable +4
  • A named variable star +3
Total score 34

16 more points to reach Epic.

Badges

  • Variable star · +5
  • Naked-eye visible · +8
  • Sun-like G-type star · +8
  • Giant star · +6
  • Gently variable · +4
  • A named variable star · +3

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads G2III + A — a G-type star: the very same spectral class as our own Sun.
  • Where it is in life. It is a giant. It has already exhausted its core hydrogen and swollen up enormously in response.
  • 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 5 you can see it with your own eyes from a dark site, over in Musca.
  • Southern sky only. So far south it never rises for most of the northern hemisphere. To see it you'd have to travel to Chile, South Africa or Australia.
  • 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.

Properties

absmag
-0.925
bv
0.804
constellation
Mus
dist ly
501.7786
luminosity
204.1738
mag
5.01
name
HR 4492
spect
G2III + A
var amplitude
0.1
var designation
GT
var max
4.981
var min
5.081

About HR 4492

HR 4492 is a rare variable star. It lies about 501.8 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Mus, shines at apparent magnitude 5.01 and has spectral type G2III + A.

Its spectrum reads G2III + A — a G-type star: the very same spectral class as our own Sun.

How to see it

Look for HR 4492 in the constellation Mus. At apparent magnitude 5.01, it can be glimpsed with the unaided eye under dark skies.

Like any astronomical target, HR 4492 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 4492 is a rare variable star

HR 4492 scores 34 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the rare tier. Another 16 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 6 science badges — Variable star, Naked-eye visible, Sun-like G-type star, Giant 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.