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Rare star 41 EP

Minelauva

RA 193.9009° · Dec 3.3975° · star

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Score breakdown

· 7 badges
41 pts · Rare
Rare 50 pts → Epic
  • Naked-eye visible +8
  • Has a proper name +8
  • Deep red star +8
  • Giant star +6
  • Cool red M-type star +5
  • Star +3
  • On the zodiac +3
Total score 41

9 more points to reach Epic.

Badges

  • Star · +3
  • Naked-eye visible · +8
  • Has a proper name · +8
  • On the zodiac · +3
  • Cool red M-type star · +5
  • Giant star · +6
  • Deep red star · +8

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads M3III — an M-type red star — and M stars are the silent majority: roughly three of every four stars in the galaxy are one.
  • Where it is in life. It is a giant. It has already exhausted its core hydrogen and swollen up enormously in response.

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 3.4 you can see it with your own eyes from a dark site, over in Virgo.
  • Seen from everywhere. It sits almost on the celestial equator, so it can be seen from essentially anywhere on Earth.
  • Best time of year. It stands highest in the middle of the night around April — 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. ≈ 3.5 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).

Properties

absmag
-0.53
bv
1.571
constellation
Vir
dist ly
198.3919
luminosity
141.9058
mag
3.39
name
Minelauva
named
yes
spect
M3III

About Minelauva

Minelauva is a rare star. It lies about 198.4 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Vir, shines at apparent magnitude 3.39 and has spectral type M3III.

Its spectrum reads M3III — an M-type red star — and M stars are the silent majority: roughly three of every four stars in the galaxy are one.

How to see it

Look for Minelauva in the constellation Vir. At apparent magnitude 3.39, it can be glimpsed with the unaided eye under dark skies.

Like any astronomical target, Minelauva 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 Minelauva is a rare star

Minelauva scores 41 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the rare tier. Another 9 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 7 science badges — Star, Naked-eye visible, Has a proper name, On the zodiac, Cool red M-type star, Giant star and Deep red 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.