hip-45544

Its story

Some 345 light-years away, an orange class K star hangs in Vela like a steady ember. Its glow set out around 1681, in the heart of Newton's age, before the Principia was published but as calculus and celestial mechanics were taking shape. Cooler than the Sun and with a swollen surface, its warm tone sets it apart among the scattered beacons of the southern hemisphere.