Lying at a distance of about 1.8 pc or 5.98 ly, Barnard's star is the fifth closest known star to Earth. Only the Sun and the three components of the Alpha Centauri system are closer. But Barnard's star is a red dwarf (spectral type M4), so despite its proximity it is too faint to see without a telescope or powerful binoculars. Its apparent magnitude is 9.54.
The proper motion at this distance corresponds to a relative lateral speed of 90 km/s.
Its closest neighbour is Ross 154, 1.66 pc or 5.41 ly away.
For many years from 1963 onwards, a substantial number of astronomers accepted a claim by Peter van de Kamp that he had detected a perturbation in the proper motion of Barnard's star consistent with its having one or more planets comparable in mass with Jupiter. When independent data were collected in the 1980s, this conclusion came to be disputed and the consensus is now that van de Kamp's claim was erroneous. During the period that the claim was accorded credibility, it contributed to the star's fame among the science fiction community and the star's adoption as a target for Project Daedalus (a plan for a prototype interstellar space probe).
Barnard's star is also known as BD+04°3561a, HIP 87937, Munich 15040, Vyssotsky 799, LHS 57, GCTP 4098.00, G 140-024 and various other technical names.
Barnard'sStar, an old and very dim red dwarf, was once thought to have two Jupiter-class planets.
The star was named after its discoverer, noted astronomer Edward Emerson Barnard (1857-1923), who found in 1916 that the star has the largest known proper motion of all known stars (10.3 arcseconds per year).
Its high space motion and sub-Solar metallicity suggests that the star is "intermediate Population II star," somewhere between a Halo and a disk star (Kürster et al, 2003; and John E.
Barnard'sstar is a star in the constellation Ophiuchus which is notable for having the largest proper motion (10.3 arcseconds per year) of any star relative to the Sun.
Although Barnard'sstar was long thought to be a quiescent, old star, astronomers recently reported a flare that was observed in 1998 (but not regarded as important by the planet-seeking astronomer who observed it), making it a surprising flare star
During the period that the claim was accorded credibility, it contributed to the star's fame among the science fiction community and the star's adoption as a target for Project Daedalus (The British Interplanetary Society's proposal for an interstellar space probe).
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