An Etymological Dictionary of Astronomy and Astrophysics

A → red supergiant star which is one of the largest and most intrinsically luminous stars in the sky. It has a radius of about 1,420 solar radii (→ solar radius) and a luminosity of 3 × 10⁵&nbspLsun (→ solar luminosity). It is about 3,900 → light-years from the Earth. Excluding solar system bodies, VY CMa is the third brightest object in the sky at 10 µm. It has a large optical → reflection nebula, visible through even small telescopes, created by its prodigious mass loss (> 10^-4&nbspMsun per year). Its initial mass is estimated to be about 25 Msun and its current mass 17 Msun. Recent observations have shown the presence of submicron → dust grains, with an average radius of ~ 0.5 μm, in the ejecta. These grains are 50 times larger than those found in the diffuse → interstellar medium (P. Scicluna et al., 2015, A&A, 584L, 10S).

See also: V and Y, following the → variable star designation scheme; → Canis Major.