56 Ceti

56 Ceti is a single^[7] star located in the equatorial constellation of Cetus. Not found in the original Bayer catalogue, it was given the Bayer-like designation Upsilon¹ Ceti by Flamsteed^[8] to distinguish it from Bayer's Upsilon Ceti, which Flamsteed designated Upsilon² or 59 Ceti. In 1801, J. E. Bode included this designation in his Uranographia,^[9] but the superscripted designations Upsilon¹ and Upsilon² are not in general use today. 56 Ceti is the Flamsteed designation for this star.

56 Ceti

Observation data Epoch J2000      Equinox J2000
Constellation	Cetus
Right ascension	01h 56m 40.20314s[1]
Declination	−22° 31′ 36.4091″[1]
Apparent magnitude (V)	4.85[2]
Characteristics
Spectral type	K3III[3]
U−B color index	+1.67[4]
B−V color index	+1.434±0.005[5]
Astrometry
Radial velocity (Rv)	+27.38±0.80[1] km/s
Proper motion (μ)	RA: +59.881[1] mas/yr Dec.: −25.633[1] mas/yr
Parallax (π)	7.3878±0.1861 mas[1]
Distance	440 ± 10 ly (135 ± 3 pc)
Absolute magnitude (MV)	−0.25[5]
Details
Radius	39.20+1.15 −2.93[1] R☉
Luminosity	391+11 −20[1] L☉
Surface gravity (log g)	1.85[2] cgs
Temperature	4,099+163 −59[1] K
Metallicity [Fe/H]	−0.18[2] dex
Other designations
56 Cet, CD−23°721, GC 2343, HD 11930, HIP 9061, HR 565, SAO 167416[6]
Database references
SIMBAD	data

This star is visible to the naked eye as a faint, orange-hued point of light with an apparent visual magnitude of 4.85.^[2] It is located about 440 light years from the Sun, based on parallax, and is drifting further away with a radial velocity of +27 km/s.^[1] 56 Ceti is an aging giant star with a stellar classification of K3III,^[3] having exhausted the supply of hydrogen at its core and expanded to 39^[1] times the Sun's radius. It is radiating 391^[1] times the luminosity of the Sun from its enlarged photosphere at an effective temperature of 4,099 K.^[1]