Phi1 Hydrae, Latinized from φ1 Hydrae, is a yellow-hued
star
A star is an astronomical object comprising a luminous spheroid of plasma held together by its gravity. The nearest star to Earth is the Sun. Many other stars are visible to the naked eye at night, but their immense distances from Earth make ...
apparent magnitude
Apparent magnitude () is a measure of the brightness of a star or other astronomical object observed from Earth. An object's apparent magnitude depends on its intrinsic luminosity, its distance from Earth, and any extinction of the object's li ...
is 7.61, making it too faint to be seen with the
naked eye
Naked eye, also called bare eye or unaided eye, is the practice of engaging in visual perception unaided by a magnifying, light-collecting optical instrument, such as a telescope or microscope, or eye protection. Vision corrected to normal ...
. Based upon an annual
parallax
Parallax is a displacement or difference in the apparent position of an object viewed along two different lines of sight and is measured by the angle or semi-angle of inclination between those two lines. Due to foreshortening, nearby object ...
shift of 12.3 mas as seen from Earth, it is located about 266
light year
A light-year, alternatively spelled light year, is a large unit of length used to express astronomical distances and is equivalent to about 9.46 trillion kilometers (), or 5.88 trillion miles ().One trillion here is taken to be 1012 ...
s from the Sun. It forms a triangle with the brighter φ2 Hydrae and φ3 Hydrae, between
μ Hydrae
μ Hydrae, Latinised as Mu Hydrae, is a solitary, orange-hued star in the equatorial constellation of Hydra. It is visible to the naked eye with an apparent visual magnitude of 3.83. Positioned just 1.8° to the south-southwest is the pla ...
and
ν Hydrae
Nu Hydrae, Latinized from ν Hydrae, is an orange-hued star in the constellation Hydra, near the border with the neighboring constellation of Crater. It has an apparent visual magnitude of 3.115, which is bright enough to be seen with t ...
.
Phi1 Hydrae is an ordinary
G-type main-sequence star
A G-type main-sequence star (Spectral type: G-V), also often, and imprecisely called a yellow dwarf, or G star, is a main-sequence star (luminosity class V) of spectral type G. Such a star has about 0.9 to 1.1 solar masses and an effective te ...
, having a Sun-like
stellar classification
In astronomy, stellar classification is the classification of stars based on their spectral characteristics. Electromagnetic radiation from the star is analyzed by splitting it with a prism or diffraction grating into a spectrum exhibiting t ...
of G2 V and a photospheric temperature only slightly higher than the sun. However, the mass is 34% greater than the Sun, and it is radiating 4.4 times the
Sun's luminosity
The solar luminosity (), is a unit of radiant flux ( power emitted in the form of photons) conventionally used by astronomers to measure the luminosity of stars, galaxies and other celestial objects in terms of the output of the Sun.
One nomi ...
. Phi1 Hydrae is moving further from the Sun with a
radial velocity
The radial velocity or line-of-sight velocity, also known as radial speed or range rate, of a target with respect to an observer is the rate of change of the distance or range between the two points. It is equivalent to the vector projection ...