13 Scorpii, a blue-white main-sequence star in Scorpius
13 Scorpii is a blue-white main-sequence star in the constellation Scorpius. At 481 light years away, it shines at an apparent visual magnitude of 4.57.
13 Scorpii (HIP 79404)
13 Scorpii is a blue-white main-sequence star in the constellation Scorpius. At 481 light years away, it shines at an apparent visual magnitude of 4.57. It is moving through the Galaxy at a speed of 41.5 km/s relative to the Sun.
Sky position: RA 16h 12.3m, Dec -27° 55.6'
Common designations: 13 Scorpii, c2 Scorpii, HR 6028, HD 145482, Gaia DR3 6042226413691523712, HIP 79404
13 Scorpii 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 13 Scorpii in the sky
13 Scorpii lies in Scorpius. With a declination of -27° 55.6', it is visible from the entire Southern Hemisphere and from the Northern Hemisphere up to about latitude 62° N. It is bright enough to see with the naked eye under dark skies. It is highest in the sky at local midnight around June, which makes the weeks around that month the best time to observe it.
Tabulated data for 13 Scorpii
Astrometry and spectroscopy
| Right Ascension (J2000) | 243.07585257° (16h 12.3m) |
| Declination (J2000) | -27.92637591° (-27° 55.6') |
| Galactic Longitude | 348.11659516° |
| Galactic Latitude | 16.83539161° |
| Proper motion RA | -12.26 mas/yr |
| Proper motion Dec | -24.25 mas/yr |
| Parallax | 6.78 ± 0.14 mas |
| Spectral Type | B2V |
| Radial Velocity | 36.93 km/s |
Photometry
| Band | Magnitude | Abs. Mag. |
|---|---|---|
| U | 3.66 | -2.18 |
| B | 4.41 | -1.43 |
| V | 4.57 | -1.27 |
| J | 4.98 | -0.86 |
| H | 5.01 | -0.83 |
| K | 4.98 | -0.87 |
Colour index B-V: -0.15
Derivations
- Heliocentric distance: 147.39 pc (481 light years) (2.1% margin of error)
- Absolute visual magnitude: -1.27
- Transverse velocity: 19.0 km/s
- Space velocity relative to the Sun: 41.5 km/s
- Galactic position (X, Y, Z): 138.0 pc, -29.0 pc, 42.7 pc
- Galactic velocity (U, V, W): 32.5 km/s, -25.3 km/s, 5.2 km/s
Data: Extended Hipparcos Compilation (XHIP) and SIMBAD.