Star profile
48 Persei
Variable starWhat is 48 Persei
48 Persei belongs to the family of so-called Be stars: blue giants that spin so fast they fling glowing rings of gas into space. That turmoil explains its long-recorded flickers in brightness, catalogued for decades as a restless variable. Its light travels nearly five centuries before reaching Perseus, where it sits quietly aside from the glare of Mirfak.
Where it is and when to see it
48 Persei lies in the northern celestial hemisphere. It is visible to the naked eye under a dark sky. Its best month of the year is December, when it culminates around midnight.
- From London it never sets and culminates about 86° up.
- From New York it culminates about 83° above the horizon.
- From Sydney it culminates about 8° above the horizon.
It can be seen from anywhere north of 42° S.
It ranks no. 13 in brightness among the 99 stars of Perseus in our catalogue. To find it, start from Mirfak, the brightest: it lies about 8° away (a fist at arm's length covers about 10°).
The light you see today left it about 480 years ago.
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Astronomical data for 48 Persei
- Constellation
- Perseus
- Apparent magnitude
- 3.96
- Distance
- 476.9 light years
- Coordinates (J2000)
- RA 62.165° · Dec 47.713°
- Catalogue
- HIP 19343 · HD 25940
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Other stars in Perseus
Perseus has 99 stars in Stelvia's catalogue. Here are a few of them.
- MirfakAlpha Persei1.79
- AlgolBeta Persei2.09
- Zeta Persei2.84
- MisamKappa Persei3.79
- AtikOmicron Persei3.84
- Tau Persei3.93
- MenkibXi Persei3.98
- Phi Persei4.01