140 Puppis, an orange giant star in Puppis
140 Puppis is an orange giant star in the constellation Puppis. At 695 light years away, it shines at an apparent visual magnitude of 4.95.
140 Puppis (HIP 37379)
140 Puppis is an orange giant star in the constellation Puppis. At 695 light years away, it shines at an apparent visual magnitude of 4.95. It is moving through the Galaxy at a speed of 28.1 km/s relative to the Sun.
Sky position: RA 7h 40.4m, Dec -15° 15.8'
Common designations: 140 Puppis, HR 2959, HD 61772, HIP 37379, Gaia DR3 3029166186781118336
140 Puppis has the spectral type K3III. K-type stars are orange stars with surface temperatures of about 3,900 to 5,300 K. Their spectra are rich in neutral metal lines and, in the cooler examples, molecular bands. Its luminosity class III marks it as a giant: an evolved star that has left the main sequence and swollen to many times its original size.
How to find 140 Puppis in the sky
140 Puppis lies in Puppis. With a declination of -15° 15.8', it is visible from the entire Southern Hemisphere and from the Northern Hemisphere up to about latitude 75° N. It is bright enough to see with the naked eye under dark skies. It is highest in the sky at local midnight around February, which makes the weeks around that month the best time to observe it.
Tabulated data for 140 Puppis
Astrometry and spectroscopy
| Right Ascension (J2000) | 115.09671018° (7h 40.4m) |
| Declination (J2000) | -15.26391964° (-15° 15.8') |
| Galactic Longitude | 232.08992023° |
| Galactic Latitude | 3.55130532° |
| Proper motion RA | -2.17 mas/yr |
| Proper motion Dec | -27.68 mas/yr |
| Parallax | 4.69 ± 0.10 mas |
| Spectral Type | K3III |
| Radial Velocity | 0.50 km/s |
Photometry
| Band | Magnitude | Abs. Mag. |
|---|---|---|
| B | 6.50 | -0.14 |
| V | 4.95 | -1.69 |
| J | 2.27 | -4.37 |
| H | 1.53 | -5.12 |
| K | 1.33 | -5.31 |
Colour index B-V: +1.55
Derivations
- Heliocentric distance: 213.15 pc (695 light years) (2.2% margin of error)
- Absolute visual magnitude: -1.69
- Transverse velocity: 28.1 km/s
- Space velocity relative to the Sun: 28.1 km/s
- Galactic position (X, Y, Z): -130.7 pc, -167.8 pc, 13.2 pc
- Galactic velocity (U, V, W): 17.5 km/s, -15.5 km/s, -15.6 km/s
Data: Extended Hipparcos Compilation (XHIP) and SIMBAD.