Theta Piscium, Latinized from θ Piscium, is a single, orange-hued

star A star is an astronomical object comprising a luminous spheroid of plasma (physics), plasma held together by its gravity. The List of nearest stars and brown dwarfs, nearest star to Earth is the Sun. Many other stars are visible to the naked ...

in the zodiac

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 origins of the e ...

Pisces Pisces may refer to: * Pisces, an obsolete (because of land vertebrates) taxonomic superclass including all fish *Pisces (astrology), an astrological sign *Pisces (constellation), a constellation **Pisces Overdensity, an overdensity of stars in t ...

, the fish. The annual parallax shift of this star was measured during the

Hipparcos ''Hipparcos'' was a scientific satellite of the European Space Agency (ESA), launched in 1989 and operated until 1993. It was the first space experiment devoted to precision astrometry, the accurate measurement of the positions of celestial obj ...

mission as 21.96

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), "Más" (''Breaking Bad''), a season three episode of ''Breaking Bad'' Songs * Más ( ...

, which yields a distance estimate of about 149

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. It is a faint star but visible to the naked eye with an apparent visual magnitude of 4.27. The star is moving away 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 temporal rate of change, rate of change of the distance or Slant range, range between the two points. It is e ...

of +6 km/s. At the estimated age of 2.5 billion years, this is an aging giant star 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 grati ...

of K1 III, which means it has exhausted the supply of hydrogen at its core. It is a red clump star, indicating it is on the

horizontal branch The horizontal branch (HB) is a stage of stellar evolution that immediately follows the red-giant branch in stars whose masses are similar to the Sun's. Horizontal-branch stars are powered by helium fusion in the core (via the triple-alpha process) ...

of its evolution and is generating energy through helium fusion at its core. Theta Piscium has 158% of the Sun's mass and its outer atmosphere has swollen to about 11 times the girth of the Sun. It is brighter yet cooler than the Sun, radiating 51.3 times the Sun's luminosity from its enlarged

photosphere The photosphere is a star's outer shell from which light is radiated. The term itself is derived from Ancient Greek roots, φῶς, φωτός/''phos, photos'' meaning "light" and σφαῖρα/''sphaira'' meaning "sphere", in reference to it ...

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 about 4,684 K.

Naming

In Chinese, (), meaning '' Thunderbolt'', refers to an asterism consisting of refers to an asterism consisting of θ Piscium, β Piscium, γ Piscium, ι Piscium and ω Piscium. Consequently, the Chinese name for θ Piscium itself is (, en, the Third Star of Thunderbolt.)AEEA (Activities of Exhibition and Education in Astronomy) 天文教育資訊網 2006 年 7 月 8 日
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References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Theta Piscium K-type giants Horizontal-branch stars Pisces (constellation) Piscium, Theta BD+05 5173 Piscium, 010 220954 115830 8916