Star profile
Alpha Mensa
Nearby starWhat is Alpha Mensa
Alpha Mensae is the brightest star of Mensa, the little constellation named by the astronomer Lacaille after Table Mountain in South Africa, from which he mapped the southern sky in the eighteenth century. It is the only alpha among all constellations that fails to reach naked-eye visibility under an average sky: a discreet solar analogue, barely 33 light years away, surprisingly similar to our own Sun. A silent neighbour in an otherwise empty region of the firmament.
Where it is and when to see it
Alpha Mensa lies in the southern celestial hemisphere. It is visible to the naked eye under a dark sky. Its best month of the year is June: the Sun sits at the opposite point of the sky and the star culminates around midnight. How high it climbs above the horizon depends on the latitude you watch from.
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The signature wall
Stelvia's sky works like a signature wall: anyone can leave their name and a message on a real star, and that signature goes up on the map for everyone to read. Signing is free.
A signature without a lock can be replaced by someone else's. The lock makes the signature permanent and lets you choose a symbolic name for the star, always shown next to the star's catalogue identifier. How the lock works
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A public signature from a real person. The chosen name is a symbolic denomination within Stelvia, with no official standing or IAU recognition: the sky is not for sale and belongs to no one.
Astronomical data for Alpha Mensa
- Constellation
- Mensa
- Apparent magnitude
- 5.08
- Distance
- 33.3 light years
- Coordinates (J2000)
- RA 92.559° · Dec -74.753°
- Catalogue
- HIP 29271 · HD 43834
A symbolic commemorative gift: neither the signature nor the chosen name implies ownership of the star or recognition by the IAU.
Other stars in Mensa
Mensa has 15 stars in Stelvia's catalogue. Here are a few of them.
- Gamma Mensa5.18
- Beta Mensa5.30
- Theta Mensa5.45
- Kappa Mensa5.46
- Eta Mensa5.47
- Mu Mensa5.53
- Epsilon Mensa5.54
- Zeta Mensa5.61