Rho Virginis (ρ Vir, ρ Virginis) is the

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. ...

for a

star A star is an astronomical object comprising a luminous spheroid of plasma (physics), plasma held together by its gravity. The List of nearest stars and brown dwarfs, nearest star to Earth is the Sun. Many other stars are visible to the naked ...

in the

constellation A constellation is an area on the celestial sphere in which a group of visible stars forms Asterism (astronomy), a perceived pattern or outline, typically representing an animal, mythological subject, or inanimate object. The origins of the e ...

Virgo. It has an apparent visual magnitude of +4.9, making it a challenge to view with the naked eye from an urban area (according to the Bortle Dark-Sky Scale). The distance to this star has been measured directly using the

parallax Parallax is a displacement or difference in the apparent position of an object viewed along two different lines of sight and is measured by the angle or semi-angle of inclination between those two lines. Due to foreshortening, nearby objects ...

method, which places it away with a margin of error of about a light year. Rho Virginis is an A-type main sequence star with a

stellar classification In astronomy, stellar classification is the classification of stars based on their stellar spectrum, spectral characteristics. Electromagnetic radiation from the star is analyzed by splitting it with a Prism (optics), prism or diffraction grati ...

of A0 V. It is larger than the Sun with a radius 60% larger and about twice the mass. As such it is generating energy at a higher rate than the Sun, with a luminosity 14 times greater. The outer atmosphere has an

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 8,930 K, which is what gives it the white-hued glow of an A-type star. It is classified as a Delta Scuti type

variable star A variable star is a star whose brightness as seen from Earth (its apparent magnitude) changes with time. This variation may be caused by a change in emitted light or by something partly blocking the light, so variable stars are classified as ...

and its brightness varies by 0.02 magnitudes over periods of 0.5 to 2.4 hours. This star has been established as a

Lambda Boötis star A Lambda Boötis star is a type of chemically peculiar star which has an unusually low abundance of iron peak elements in its surface layers. One possible explanation for this is that it is the result of accretion of metal-poor gas from a circumste ...

that displays low abundances of

iron peak The iron peak is a local maximum in the vicinity of Fe ( Cr, Mn, Fe, Co and Ni) on the graph of the abundances of the chemical elements. For elements lighter than iron on the periodic table, nuclear fusion releases energy. For iron, and for ...

elements. It displays an excess of infrared emission, but it is unclear whether this is being caused by a circumstellar debris disk or from the star passing through and heating up a diffuse interstellar dust cloud. Most likely it is the former, in which case the dusty disk has a radius of around 37 AU and a mean temperature of 90 K.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rho Virginis Virginis, Rho Virgo (constellation) Delta Scuti variables A-type main-sequence stars Virginis, 030 061960 4828 110411 Durchmusterung objects