Alpha Leporis (α Leporis, abbreviated Alpha Lep, α Lep), formally named Arneb , is the brightest

star A star is an astronomical object comprising a luminous spheroid of plasma held together by its gravity. The nearest star to Earth is the Sun. Many other stars are visible to the naked eye at night, but their immense distances from Earth ma ...

in the constellation of

Lepus Hares and jackrabbits are mammals belonging to the genus ''Lepus''. They are herbivores, and live solitarily or in pairs. They nest in slight depressions called forms, and their young are able to fend for themselves shortly after birth. The gen ...

Nomenclature

''Alpha Leporis'' is the star's

Bayer designation A Bayer designation is a stellar designation in which a specific star is identified by a Greek or Latin letter followed by the genitive form of its parent constellation's Latin name. The original list of Bayer designations contained 1,564 stars. T ...

. The traditional name ''Arneb'' comes from the Arabic ''أرنب'' ''’arnab'' 'hare' ('Lepus' is Latin for

hare Hares and jackrabbits are mammals belonging to the genus ''Lepus''. They are herbivores, and live solitarily or in pairs. They nest in slight depressions called forms, and their young are able to fend for themselves shortly after birth. The gen ...

). In 2016, the

International Astronomical Union The International Astronomical Union (IAU; french: link=yes, Union astronomique internationale, UAI) is a nongovernmental organisation with the objective of advancing astronomy in all aspects, including promoting astronomical research, outreach ...

organized a

Working Group on Star Names The International Astronomical Union (IAU) established a Working Group on Star Names (WGSN) in May 2016 to catalog and standardize proper names for stars for the international astronomical community. It operates under Division C – Education ...

(WGSN) to catalog and standardize proper names for stars. The WGSN's first bulletin of July 2016 included a table of the first two batches of names approved by the WGSN; which included ''Arneb'' for this star. In

Chinese Chinese can refer to: * Something related to China * Chinese people, people of Chinese nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity **''Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic concept of the Chinese nation ** List of ethnic groups in China, people of v ...

, (), meaning ''

Toilet A toilet is a piece of sanitary hardware that collects human urine and feces, and sometimes toilet paper, usually for disposal. Flush toilets use water, while dry or non-flush toilets do not. They can be designed for a sitting position pop ...

'', refers to an asterism consisting of α Leporis, β Leporis, γ Leporis and δ Leporis. Consequently, the

Chinese name Chinese names or Chinese personal names are names used by individuals from Greater China and other parts of the Chinese-speaking world throughout East and Southeast Asia (ESEA). In addition, many names used in Japan, Korea and Vietnam are often a ...

for α Leporis itself is (), "the First Star of Toilet".香港太空館 - 研究資源 - 亮星中英對照表
, Hong Kong Space Museum. Accessed on line November 23, 2010.

Properties

This is a massive star with about 14 times the

mass of the Sun The solar mass () is a standard unit of mass in astronomy, equal to approximately . It is often used to indicate the masses of other stars, as well as stellar clusters, nebulae, galaxies and black holes. It is approximately equal to the mass of ...

. The

interferometer Interferometry is a technique which uses the ''interference'' of superimposed waves to extract information. Interferometry typically uses electromagnetic waves and is an important investigative technique in the fields of astronomy, fiber opti ...

-measured

angular diameter The angular diameter, angular size, apparent diameter, or apparent size is an angular distance describing how large a sphere or circle appears from a given point of view. In the vision sciences, it is called the visual angle, and in optics, it i ...

of this star, after correction for

limb darkening Limb darkening is an optical effect seen in stars (including the Sun), where the central part of the disk appears brighter than the edge, or ''limb''. Its understanding offered early solar astronomers an opportunity to construct models with such ...

, is . At an estimated distance of , this yields a physical size of about 129 times the

radius of the Sun Solar radius is a unit of distance used to express the size of stars in astronomy relative to the Sun. The solar radius is usually defined as the radius to the layer in the Sun's photosphere where the optical depth equals 2/3: :1\,R_ = 6.957\tim ...

. Alpha Leporis has a

stellar classification In astronomy, stellar classification is the classification of stars based on their spectral characteristics. Electromagnetic radiation from the star is analyzed by splitting it with a prism or diffraction grating into a spectrum exhibiting th ...

of F0 Ib, with the Ib luminosity class indicating that it is a lower luminosity

supergiant Supergiants are among the most massive and most luminous stars. Supergiant stars occupy the top region of the Hertzsprung–Russell diagram with absolute visual magnitudes between about −3 and −8. The temperature range of supergiant stars sp ...

star. Since 1943, the

spectrum A spectrum (plural ''spectra'' or ''spectrums'') is a condition that is not limited to a specific set of values but can vary, without gaps, across a continuum. The word was first used scientifically in optics to describe the rainbow of colors ...

of this star has served as one of the stable anchor points by which other stars are classified. The

effective temperature The effective temperature of a body such as a star or planet is the temperature of a black body that would emit the same total amount of electromagnetic radiation. Effective temperature is often used as an estimate of a body's surface temperature ...

of the outer envelope is about 6,850 K, which gives the star a yellow-white hue that is typical of

F-type star An F-type main-sequence star (F V) is a main-sequence, hydrogen-fusing star of spectral type F and luminosity class V. These stars have from 1.0 to 1.4 times the mass of the Sun and surface temperatures between 6,000 and 7,600 K.Tables VII ...

s. It is an estimated 13 million years old. Alpha Leporis is an older, dying star that may have already passed through a

phase and is now contracting and heating up in the latter phases of

stellar evolution Stellar evolution is the process by which a star changes over the course of time. Depending on the mass of the star, its lifetime can range from a few million years for the most massive to trillions of years for the least massive, which is cons ...

, or perhaps is still expanding into the supergiant phase. Based upon its estimated mass, it is expected to end its life in a spectacular stellar explosion known as a supernova. However, this is not expected to happen for another million years.

Arneb in Military

USS Arneb (AKA-56) USS ''Arneb'' (AKA-56/LKA-56) was an ''Andromeda''-class attack cargo ship named after ''Arneb,'' the brightest star in the southern constellation ''Lepus.'' She served as a commissioned ship for 27 years and 3 months, the longest time in comm ...

was a ship of the United States navy.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Alpha Leporis Leporis, Alpha Lepus (constellation) F-type supergiants

Arneb Alpha Leporis (α Leporis, abbreviated Alpha Lep, α Lep), formally named Arneb , is the brightest star in the constellation of Lepus. Nomenclature ''Alpha Leporis'' is the star's Bayer designation. The traditional name ''Arneb'' com ...

Leporis, 11 025985

1865 Events January–March * January 4 – The New York Stock Exchange opens its first permanent headquarters at 10-12 Broad near Wall Street, in New York City. * January 13 – American Civil War : Second Battle of Fort Fisher ...

036673 Durchmusterung objects Triple star systems Suspected variables