hip-54360

Its story

In the body of the Centaur, a white A-type star reveals a subtle variability: its brightness shifts slowly, like an almost imperceptible heartbeat. Its light set out 274 years ago, around the time Diderot and D'Alembert were publishing the first volumes of the Encyclopédie in 1751. Hotter than the Sun, its pulsations make it one of those stars astronomers track patiently, hoping to decipher the deep rhythm of its atmosphere.