Article · Wikipedia archive · Last revised Jun 6, 2026

Beta Volantis

Beta Volantis, Latinized from β Volantis, is the second-brightest star of the southern constellation of Volans, after Gamma2 Volantis. It has an apparent visual magnitude of 3.75, which is sufficiently bright to allow it to be viewed with the naked eye. Based upon an annual parallax shift of 30.33 mas as seen from Earth, its distance can be estimated as 107.5 light years from the Sun. The star is moving away from the Sun with a radial velocity of +27 km/s.

Last revised
Jun 6, 2026
Read time
≈ 3 min
Length
687 w
Citations
27
Source
Wikipedia ↗
Beta Volantis
Location of β Volantis.
Observation data
Epoch J2000      Equinox J2000
Constellation Volans1
Right ascension 08h 25m 44.19472s2
Declination −66° 08′ 12.8050″2
Apparent magnitude (V) 3.753
Characteristics
Evolutionary stage horizontal branch4
Spectral type K2 III5
B−V color index +1.133
Astrometry
Radial velocity (Rv)+27.4±0.76 km/s
Proper motion (μ) RA: −35.74±0.102 mas/yr
Dec.: −152.22±0.102 mas/yr
Parallax (π)30.33±0.10 mas2
Distance107.5 ± 0.4 ly
(33.0 ± 0.1 pc)
Absolute magnitude (MV)+1.181
Details
Mass1.62±0.207 M☉
Radius10.08 R☉
Luminosity428 L☉
Surface gravity (log g)2.309 cgs
Temperature4,6508 K
Metallicity [Fe/H]−0.0110 dex
Rotational velocity (v sin i)<1.011 km/s
Other designations
β Vol, CD−65°648, GJ 3499, HD 71878, HIP 41312, HR 3347, SAO 25022812
Database references
SIMBADdata

Beta Volantis, Latinized from β Volantis, is the second-brightest star of the southern constellation of Volans, after Gamma2 Volantis. It has an apparent visual magnitude of 3.75,3 which is sufficiently bright to allow it to be viewed with the naked eye. Based upon an annual parallax shift of 30.33 mas as seen from Earth, its distance can be estimated as 107.5 light years from the Sun. The star is moving away from the Sun with a radial velocity of +27 km/s.6

This is a single,13 orange-hued star with a stellar classification of K2 III,5 indicating it is an evolved K-type giant star. It is a red clump star,4 which means it is on the horizontal branch and is generating energy through helium fusion at its core. The stellar mass has been estimated via astroseismology, giving a value of 1.6 times the mass of the Sun.7 It has expanded to 10 times the radius of the Sun and is radiating about 42 times the Sun's luminosity from its enlarged photosphere at an effective temperature of 4,650 K.8

References

References

  1. Anderson, E.; Francis, Ch. (2012). "XHIP: An extended hipparcos compilation". Astronomy Letters. 38 (5): 331. arXiv:1108.4971. Bibcode:2012AstL...38..331A. doi:10.1134/S1063773712050015. XHIP record for this object at VizieR.
  2. van Leeuwen, F. (November 2007), "Validation of the new Hipparcos reduction", Astronomy and Astrophysics, 474 (2): 653–664, arXiv:0708.1752, Bibcode:2007A&A...474..653V, doi:10.1051/0004-6361:20078357, S2CID 18759600.
  3. Cousins, A. W. J. (1977), "Cape UBV magnitudes and colours of South circumpolar stars", South African Astronomical Observatory Circulars, 1: 51, Bibcode:1977SAAOC...1...51C.
  4. Paczynski, B.; et al. (September 1999), "The Optical Gravitational Lensing Experiment. UBVI Photometry of Stars in Baade's Window", Acta Astronomica, 49: 319–339, arXiv:astro-ph/9908043, Bibcode:1999AcA....49..319P.
  5. Gray, R. O.; et al. (2003), "Contributions to the Nearby Stars (NStars) Project: Spectroscopy of Stars Earlier than M0 within 40 Parsecs: The Northern Sample. I", The Astronomical Journal, 126 (4): 2048, arXiv:astro-ph/0308182, Bibcode:2003AJ....126.2048G, doi:10.1086/378365, S2CID 119417105.
  6. Gontcharov, G. A. (November 2006), "Pulkovo Compilation of Radial Velocities for 35495 Hipparcos stars in a common system", Astronomy Letters, 32 (11): 759–771, arXiv:1606.08053, Bibcode:2006AstL...32..759G, doi:10.1134/S1063773706110065, S2CID 119231169.
  7. Stello, D.; et al. (2008), "Oscillating K Giants with the WIRE Satellite: Determination of Their Asteroseismic Masses", The Astrophysical Journal Letters, 674 (1): L53–L56, arXiv:0801.2155, Bibcode:2008ApJ...674L..53S, doi:10.1086/528936, S2CID 15094067.
  8. Hon, Marc; Huber, Daniel; Kuszlewicz, James S.; Stello, Dennis; Sharma, Sanjib; Tayar, Jamie; Zinn, Joel C.; Vrard, Mathieu; Pinsonneault, Marc H. (2021). "A "Quick Look" at All-sky Galactic Archeology with TESS: 158,000 Oscillating Red Giants from the MIT Quick-look Pipeline". The Astrophysical Journal. 919 (2): 131. arXiv:2108.01241. Bibcode:2021ApJ...919..131H. doi:10.3847/1538-4357/ac14b1.
  9. Cardiel, Nicolás; Zamorano, Jaime; Bará, Salvador; Sánchez De Miguel, Alejandro; Cabello, Cristina; Gallego, Jesús; García, Lucía; González, Rafael; Izquierdo, Jaime; Pascual, Sergio; Robles, José; Sánchez, Ainhoa; Tapia, Carlos (2021). "Synthetic RGB photometry of bright stars: Definition of the standard photometric system and UCM library of spectrophotometric spectra". Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. 504 (3): 3730. arXiv:2103.17009. Bibcode:2021MNRAS.504.3730C. doi:10.1093/mnras/stab997.
  10. Heiter, U.; Jofré, P.; Gustafsson, B.; Korn, A. J.; Soubiran, C.; Thévenin, F. (2015), "Gaia FGK benchmark stars: Effective temperatures and surface gravities", Astronomy & Astrophysics, 582: A49, arXiv:1506.06095, Bibcode:2015A&A...582A..49H, doi:10.1051/0004-6361/201526319, S2CID 53391939.
  11. De Medeiros, J. R.; Alves, S.; Udry, S.; Andersen, J.; Nordström, B.; Mayor, M. (January 2014). "A catalog of rotational and radial velocities for evolved stars: V. Southern stars". Astronomy & Astrophysics. 561: A126. arXiv:1312.3474. Bibcode:2014A&A...561A.126D. doi:10.1051/0004-6361/201220762. ISSN 0004-6361.
  12. "bet Vol". SIMBAD. Centre de données astronomiques de Strasbourg. Retrieved 2017-09-09.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: postscript (link)
  13. Eggleton, P. P.; Tokovinin, A. A. (September 2008), "A catalogue of multiplicity among bright stellar systems", Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 389 (2): 869–879, arXiv:0806.2878, Bibcode:2008MNRAS.389..869E, doi:10.1111/j.1365-2966.2008.13596.x, S2CID 14878976.