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Common variable star 15 EP

HR 4684

RA 184.7584° · Dec 26.0083° · star

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Score breakdown

· 4 badges
15 pts · Common
Common 22 pts → Uncommon
  • Variable star +5
  • White A-type star +5
  • A named variable star +3
  • Barely variable (under 0.05 mag) +2
Total score 15

7 more points to reach Uncommon.

Badges

  • Variable star · +5
  • White A-type star · +5
  • Barely variable (under 0.05 mag) · +2
  • A named variable star · +3

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.
  • 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 6.4 it is just past naked-eye reach — ordinary binoculars will pull it in, over in Coma Berenices.
  • 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. ≈ 4.9 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).

Properties

absmag
1.775
bv
0.18
constellation
Com
dist ly
279.4824
luminosity
16.9824
mag
6.44
name
HR 4684
spect
Am
var amplitude
0.02
var designation
FM
var max
6.432
var min
6.452

About HR 4684

HR 4684 is a common variable star. It lies about 279.5 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Com, shines at apparent magnitude 6.44 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 HR 4684 in the constellation Com. At apparent magnitude 6.44, it is an easy target for binoculars.

Like any astronomical target, HR 4684 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 4684 is a common variable star

HR 4684 scores 15 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the common tier. Another 7 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 4 science badges — Variable star, White A-type star, Barely variable (under 0.05 mag) 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.