· · · ·

Omicron2 Orionis

9 Orionis

A orange star at the northern tip of the arc of stars known as Orion's Shield, Omicron2 Orionis falls between blue Bellatrix in Orion and orange Aldebaran in Taurus. It forms part of an apparent pair with Omicron1 Orionis, which lies nearby in the sky. Actually these two 'Omicron' stars are unrelated: Omicron1 lies more than three times as far from the Solar System as Omicron2, and is actually considerably more luminous (though its greater distance makes it appear slightly fainter than Omicron2 in the skies of Earth).

Omicron2 Orionis is a giant star, being nearly twenty times its diameter, but this is not unusually large for a giant star. The orange giant at the heart of the Omicron2 system appears to have a companion star orbiting it at a distance of some 2,000 AU (that is, some hundred times that of Uranus' distance from the Sun).

Indexes

Related Entries