Star profile
Alpha Lupi
Variable starWhat is Alpha Lupi
Alpha Lupi anchors the heart of the southern Wolf with a quiet blue-white glow: it belongs to the Beta Cephei family of variables, giants that swell and contract every few hours in pulses too subtle for the naked eye. At 465 light-years, it is a serious candidate to one day erupt as a supernova on a cosmic timescale. The light arriving tonight set out before Galileo first turned his glass skyward.
Where it is and when to see it
Alpha Lupi lies in the southern celestial hemisphere. It is visible to the naked eye under a dark sky. Its best month of the year is May: 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 Lupi
- Constellation
- Lupus
- Apparent magnitude
- 2.30
- Distance
- 464.7 light years
- Coordinates (J2000)
- RA 220.482° · Dec -47.388°
- Catalogue
- HIP 71860 · HD 129056
A symbolic commemorative gift: neither the signature nor the chosen name implies ownership of the star or recognition by the IAU.
Other stars in Lupus
Lupus has 74 stars in Stelvia's catalogue. Here are a few of them.
- Beta Lupi2.68
- Gamma Lupi2.80
- Delta Lupi3.22
- Epsilon Lupi3.37
- Zeta Lupi3.41
- Eta Lupi3.42
- Iota Lupi3.55
- Phi 1 Lupi3.57