Beta Pictoris
Star
Beta Pictoris — a hot, brilliant young A-type star (~1.8 solar masses, only ~23 million years old) 63 light-years away in Pictor. It is one of the most important stars in the study of how planets form: it is encircled by a vast, edge-on disk of dust and debris — the first ever imaged around another star — with giant planets forming and sweeping within it.
Open in 3D viewSee Beta Pictoris in the live, interactive 3D map
Key facts
Mass
3.56 × 10³⁰ kg
1.79 M☉
Radius
1,074,161 km
1.54× wider than the Sun
Surface temperature
8,039 K (7766 °C)
Spectral type
A6V (a hot blue-white star), extremely young (~23 million years)
Science
Physical
- Mass
- 3.56 × 10³⁰ kg · 1.79 M☉
- Radius
- 1,074,161 km · 1.54× wider than the Sun
- Density
- 685 kg/m³ · 0.69× water
- Spectral type
- A6V (a hot blue-white star), extremely young (~23 million years)
Composition
- By mass
- A hot main-sequence star about 1.8 solar masses and only ~23 million years old — an infant by stellar standards, still encircled by the dusty debris of planet formation and hosting giant planets young enough to glow with their own heat.
Temperature
- Surface
- 8,039 K (7766 °C)
Radiation & temperature
- Luminosity
- 3.43 × 10²⁷ W · 8.97 L☉
- Surface temperature
- 8,039 K (7766 °C)
- Peak wavelength
- 360 nm · ultraviolet (invisible to the eye)
Discovery & history
- Name
- A Bayer designation (β Pictoris) — the 'beta' star of Pictor, the Painter's Easel.
Its huge infrared glow, noticed in 1983, led in 1984 to the first image of a debris disk around another star. Decades of study then found a giant planet (Beta Pic b) directly imaged sweeping through the disk in 2008, and more since — making it a living laboratory of planet formation.
Images
Images from open archives · credit shown per image