Eta Eridani

Nomenclature

η Eridani (Latinised to Eta Eridani) is the star's Bayer designation.

It bore the traditional name Azha ("the breeding place"), a corruption of the Persian آشيانه āšiyāne "the (ostrich) nest"". In 2016, the International Astronomical Union organized a Working Group on Star Names (WGSN) to catalogue and standardize proper names for stars. The WGSN approved the name Azha for this star on 12 September 2016 and it is now so entered in the IAU Catalog of Star Names.

In Chinese, 天苑 (Tiān Yuàn), meaning Celestial Meadows, refers to an asterism consisting of Eta Eridani, Gamma Eridani, Pi Eridani, Delta Eridani, Epsilon Eridani, Zeta Eridani, Pi Ceti, Tau1 Eridani, Tau2 Eridani, Tau3 Eridani, Tau4 Eridani, Tau5 Eridani, Tau6 Eridani, Tau7 Eridani, Tau8 Eridani and Tau9 Eridani. Consequently, Eta Eridani itself is known as 天苑六 (Tiān Yuàn liù, English: the Sixth Star of Celestial Meadows.)

Properties

η Eridani belongs to spectral class K3 and has a giant luminosity class. It is an evolved star that has expanded to tens times the size of the sun and nearly sixty times its luminosity. It is red clump giant, a star slightly more massive than the sun which is currently fusing helium in its core.

η Eridani is a high proper motion star, a relatively close star that is moving across the sky at a high rate compared to most stars. It is suspected to be a variable star with a range from magnitude 3.81 to 3.90.

Barium star

η Eridani is a mild barium star, sometimes referred to a "semi-barium" star. Although most barium stars are in binary systems, η Eridani has no known companion.