b Puppis, a blue-white main-sequence star in Puppis
b Puppis is a blue-white main-sequence star in the constellation Puppis. At 788 light years away, it shines at an apparent visual magnitude of 4.47.
b Puppis (HIP 38455)
b Puppis is a blue-white main-sequence star in the constellation Puppis. At 788 light years away, it shines at an apparent visual magnitude of 4.47. It is moving through the Galaxy at a speed of 31.5 km/s relative to the Sun.
Sky position: RA 7h 52.6m, Dec -38° 51.8'
Common designations: b Puppis, QZ Puppis, HR 3084, HD 64503, Gaia DR3 5537733610870346880, HIP 38455
b Puppis has the spectral type B2V. B-type stars are hot (about 10,000 to 30,000 K), luminous and blue-white. They are massive, short-lived stars, typically only tens of millions of years old, and are common in young clusters and OB associations. Its luminosity class V means it is a main-sequence (dwarf) star, still fusing hydrogen into helium in its core like the Sun.
How to find b Puppis in the sky
b Puppis lies in Puppis. With a declination of -38° 51.8', it is visible from the entire Southern Hemisphere and from the Northern Hemisphere up to about latitude 51° N. Observers poleward of latitude 51° S see it as circumpolar: it never sets. 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 b Puppis
Astrometry and spectroscopy
| Right Ascension (J2000) | 118.16102874° (7h 52.6m) |
| Declination (J2000) | -38.86281461° (-38° 51.8') |
| Galactic Longitude | 253.89941612° |
| Galactic Latitude | -5.92526934° |
| Proper motion RA | -8.94 mas/yr |
| Proper motion Dec | 3.89 mas/yr |
| Parallax | 4.14 ± 0.17 mas |
| Spectral Type | B2V |
| Radial Velocity | 29.50 km/s |
Photometry
| Band | Magnitude | Abs. Mag. |
|---|---|---|
| U | 3.61 | -3.31 |
| B | 4.30 | -2.62 |
| V | 4.47 | -2.44 |
| J | 4.84 | -2.08 |
| H | 4.95 | -1.97 |
| K | 4.94 | -1.97 |
Colour index B-V: -0.17
Derivations
- Heliocentric distance: 241.73 pc (788 light years) (4.1% margin of error)
- Absolute visual magnitude: -2.44
- Transverse velocity: 11.2 km/s
- Space velocity relative to the Sun: 31.5 km/s
- Galactic position (X, Y, Z): -66.7 pc, -231.0 pc, -25.0 pc
- Galactic velocity (U, V, W): -16.6 km/s, -25.0 km/s, -9.6 km/s
Data: Extended Hipparcos Compilation (XHIP) and SIMBAD.