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Uncommon star 29 EP

HD 122361

RA 211.0450° · Dec -68.6175° · star

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Score breakdown

· 4 badges
29 pts · Uncommon
Uncommon 34 pts → Rare
  • Bright giant +12
  • Sun-like G-type star +8
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) +6
  • Star +3
Total score 29

5 more points to reach Rare.

Badges

  • Star · +3
  • Distant (over 1,000 light-years) · +6
  • Sun-like G-type star · +8
  • Bright giant · +12

Trivia

What it actually is

  • Spectral class. Its spectrum reads G5II/III — a G-type star: the very same spectral class as our own Sun.
  • Where it is in life. It is a bright giant, well on its way to the largest stars there are.

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 8.6 it is just past naked-eye reach — ordinary binoculars will pull it in, over in Circinus.
  • 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 April — that's when to go looking.

Could we get there?

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

Getting there

  • Aboard Voyager 1. ≈ 42.5 million years at Voyager 1's speed (17 km/s).

Properties

absmag
-0.798
bv
0.87
constellation
Cir
dist ly
2415.9702
luminosity
181.6352
mag
8.55
name
HD 122361
spect
G5II/III

About HD 122361

HD 122361 is an uncommon star. It lies about 2,416 light-years from Earth, sits in the constellation Cir, shines at apparent magnitude 8.55 and has spectral type G5II/III.

Its spectrum reads G5II/III — a G-type star: the very same spectral class as our own Sun.

How to see it

Look for HD 122361 in the constellation Cir. At apparent magnitude 8.55, it is an easy target for binoculars.

Like any astronomical target, HD 122361 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 HD 122361 is an uncommon star

HD 122361 scores 29 points on Spacedle's rarity scale, which places it in the uncommon tier. Another 5 points would lift it into a rarer tier.

That score comes from 4 science badges — Star, Distant (over 1,000 light-years), Sun-like G-type star and Bright giant — 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.