Tau Piscis Austrini (τ Piscis Austrini) is a solitary yellow-white star in the southern

constellation A constellation is an area on the celestial sphere in which a group of visible stars forms Asterism (astronomy), a perceived pattern or outline, typically representing an animal, mythological subject, or inanimate object. The first constellati ...

Piscis Austrinus Piscis Austrinus is a constellation in the southern celestial hemisphere. The name is Latin for "the southern fish", in contrast with the larger constellation Pisces, which represents a pair of fish. Before the 20th century, it was also known as ...

. It is visible to the naked eye with an

apparent visual magnitude Apparent magnitude () is a measure of the brightness of a star, astronomical object or other celestial objects like artificial satellites. Its value depends on its intrinsic luminosity, its distance, and any extinction of the object's light ca ...

of +4.9. Based on an annual

parallax Parallax is a displacement or difference in the apparent position of an object viewed along two different sightline, lines of sight and is measured by the angle or half-angle of inclination between those two lines. Due to perspective (graphica ...

shift of 54.71

mas Mas, Más or MAS may refer to: Film and TV * Más y Menos, fictional superhero characters, from the Teen Titans animated television series * "Más" (''Breaking Bad''), a season three episode of ''Breaking Bad'' Music Albums * ''Más'' (album), ...

, the star is located approximately 59.6

light year A light-year, alternatively spelled light year (ly or lyr), is a unit of length used to express astronomical distance, astronomical distances and is equal to exactly , which is approximately 9.46 trillion km or 5.88 trillion mi. As defined by t ...

s from the

Sun The Sun is the star at the centre of the Solar System. It is a massive, nearly perfect sphere of hot plasma, heated to incandescence by nuclear fusion reactions in its core, radiating the energy from its surface mainly as visible light a ...

. This is an

F-type main sequence star An F-type main-sequence star (F V) is a main-sequence, hydrogen-fusing star of spectral type F and luminosity class V. These stars have from 1.0 to 1.4 times the mass of the Sun and surface temperatures between 6,000 and 7,600 K.Tables ...

with a

stellar classification In astronomy, stellar classification is the classification of stars based on their stellar spectrum, spectral characteristics. Electromagnetic radiation from the star is analyzed by splitting it with a Prism (optics), prism or diffraction gratin ...

of F6 V. It is about 1.3 billion years old with a

projected rotational velocity Stellar rotation is the angular motion of a star about its axis. The rate of rotation can be measured from the spectrum of the star, or by timing the movements of active features on the surface. The rotation of a star produces an equatorial bu ...

of 14 km/s and exhibits a low level of activity. The star has an estimated 1.34 times the

mass of the Sun The solar mass () is a frequently used unit of mass in astronomy, equal to approximately . It is approximately equal to the mass of the Sun. It is often used to indicate the masses of other stars, as well as stellar clusters, nebulae, galaxies a ...

and 1.45 times the

Sun's radius Solar radius is a unit of distance used to express the size of objects in astronomy relative to the Sun. The solar radius is usually defined as the radius to the layer in the Sun's photosphere where the optical depth equals 2/3: 1\,R_ = 6.957\ti ...

. It is radiating 2.82 times the

solar luminosity The solar luminosity () is a unit of radiant flux (Power (physics), power emitted in the form of photons) conventionally used by astronomers to measure the luminosity of stars, galaxy, galaxies and other celestial objects in terms of the output of ...

from its

photosphere The photosphere is a star's outer shell from which light is radiated. It extends into a star's surface until the plasma becomes opaque, equivalent to an optical depth of approximately , or equivalently, a depth from which 50% of light will esc ...

at an

effective temperature The effective temperature of a body such as a star or planet is the temperature of a black body that would emit the same total amount of electromagnetic radiation. Effective temperature is often used as an estimate of a body's surface temperature ...

of 6,324 K. This star is a candidate for hosting a

debris disk A debris disk (American English), or debris disc ( Commonwealth English), is a circumstellar disk of dust and debris in orbit around a star. Sometimes these disks contain prominent rings, as seen in the image of Fomalhaut on the right. Debris ...

, having initially shown a near-infrared excess, which diminished with further observations.

Naming

Chinese Chinese may refer to: * Something related to China * Chinese people, people identified with China, through nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity **Han Chinese, East Asian ethnic group native to China. **'' Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic ...

, (), meaning '' Celestial Money'', refers to an asterism consisting of τ Piscis Austrini, 13 Piscis Austrini, θ Piscis Austrini, ι Piscis Austrini and μ Piscis Austrini. Consequently, the

Chinese name Chinese may refer to: * Something related to China * Chinese people, people identified with China, through nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity **Han Chinese, East Asian ethnic group native to China. **'' Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethni ...

for τ Piscis Austrini itself is (, .)AEEA (Activities of Exhibition and Education in Astronomy) 天文教育資訊網 2006 年 7 月 5 日

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Tau Piscis Austrini F-type main-sequence stars Piscis Austrini, Tau Piscis Austrinus Durchmusterung objects Piscis Austrini, 15 210302 109422 8447