Star profile
Alpha Antliae
What is Alpha Antliae
Alpha Antliae is the chief light of the Air Pump, the modest constellation Lacaille traced in honour of Boyle's vacuum pump. It is an orange giant on the asymptotic branch, forty-one times the radius of the Sun; one day —millions of years from now— it will end its life as a Mira variable, pulsating with enormous amplitude before fading.
Where it is and when to see it
Alpha Antliae lies in the southern celestial hemisphere. It is visible to the naked eye under a dark sky. Its best month of the year is March: 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 Antliae
- Constellation
- Antlia
- Apparent magnitude
- 4.28
- Distance
- 366.1 light years
- Coordinates (J2000)
- RA 156.788° · Dec -31.068°
- Catalogue
- HIP 51172 · HD 90610
A symbolic commemorative gift: neither the signature nor the chosen name implies ownership of the star or recognition by the IAU.
Other stars in Antlia
Antlia has 23 stars in Stelvia's catalogue. Here are a few of them.
- Epsilon Antliae4.51
- Iota Antliae4.60
- Theta Antliae4.78
- Eta Antliae5.23
- HIP 508885.34
- HIP 541735.43
- HIP 465785.49
- HIP 518215.50