Xi² Ceti, Latinized from ξ² Ceti, is a star located in the

equatorial Equatorial may refer to something related to: *Earth's equator **the tropics, the Earth's equatorial region **tropical climate *the Celestial equator ** equatorial orbit **equatorial coordinate system ** equatorial mount, of telescopes * equatorial ...

constellation of

Cetus Cetus () is a constellation, sometimes called 'the whale' in English. The Cetus was a sea monster in Greek mythology which both Perseus and Heracles needed to slay. Cetus is in the region of the sky that contains other water-related constellat ...

. It is visible to the naked eye with an

apparent visual magnitude Apparent magnitude () is a measure of the brightness of a star or other astronomical object observed from Earth. An object's apparent magnitude depends on its intrinsic luminosity, its distance from Earth, and any extinction of the object's lig ...

of +4.3. This star is located at a distance of approximately 197 light years from the

Sun The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It is a nearly perfect ball of hot plasma, heated to incandescence by nuclear fusion reactions in its core. The Sun radiates this energy mainly as light, ultraviolet, and infrared radi ...

based on parallax, and is drifting further away with a radial velocity of 12 km/s. It made its closest approach some 2.7 million years ago at a distance of around . Xi² Ceti is a spectrophotometric standard star. It displays a stellar classification of B9.5III, which suggests it has exhausted its core hydrogen, evolved away from the main sequence, and expanded to become a

giant star A giant star is a star with substantially larger radius and luminosity than a main-sequence (or ''dwarf'') star of the same surface temperature.Giant star, entry in ''Astronomy Encyclopedia'', ed. Patrick Moore, New York: Oxford University Press ...

, although still only 127 million years old. It has 2.45 times the mass and 2.6 times the radius of the Sun. In

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, (), meaning '' Circular Celestial Granary'', refers to an asterism consisting of α Ceti, κ¹ Ceti, λ Ceti, μ Ceti, ξ¹ Ceti, ξ² Ceti, ν Ceti, γ Ceti, δ Ceti, 75 Ceti, 70 Ceti, 63 Ceti and 66 Ceti. 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 ofte ...

for Xi² Ceti itself is "the Sixth Star of Circular Celestial Granary", .AEEA (Activities of Exhibition and Education in Astronomy) 天文教育資訊網 2006 年 7 月 11 日
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References

External links

* *http://server3.wikisky.org/starview?object_type=1&object_id=889 *http://www.alcyone.de/cgi-bin/search.pl?object=HR0718 {{DEFAULTSORT:Xi2 Ceti Cetus, Xi2 Cetus (constellation) Cetus, Xi2 Durchmusterung objects Ceti, 73 015318 011484 0718