V1054 Ophiuchi, together with the star Gliese 643, is a nearby quintuple star system. In the constellation Ophiuchus at a distance of 21.19 light-years. It consists of five stars, all of which are red dwarfs. The alternative designation of Wolf 630 forms the namesake of a moving group of stars that share a similar motion through space.[8]
Overview
V1054 Ophiuchi/Gliese 643 has the largest number of stars of all star systems located within 10 pc from Earth.[4] It is also the nearest quintuple star system[3] (the next nearest star systems with at least five stars are GJ 2069 (quintuple)[4] at 41.8 light-years, and Castor[3] (sextuple) at 51.6 light-years), and the only quintuple star system within 10 pc.[4][9]
The system consists of three widely separated parts:
close triple subsystem V1054 Ophiuchi A-Bab (including very close binary subsystem V1054 Ophiuchi Bab)
V1054 Ophiuchi/Gliese 643 (without V1054 Ophiuchi C)
V1054 Ophiuchi A‑Bab
V1054 Ophiuchi Bab
V1054 Ophiuchi Ba
V1054 Ophiuchi Bb
V1054 Ophiuchi A
Gliese 643
V1054 Ophiuchi C (vB 8)
The brightest and most massive of these five stars is V1054 Ophiuchi A. The close binary subsystem V1054 Ophiuchi B is more massive than V1054 Ophiuchi A, however, its total visual magnitude is 0.1 mag fainter than V1054 Ophiuchi A's visual magnitude.[3]
The total apparent magnitude of the V1054 Ophiuchi A-Bab triple subsystem is 9.02.[3][10]
Despite V1054 Ophiuchi/Gliese 643 consisting of low-mass stars, the system's total mass, due to the large number of components, exceeds the Solar mass,[3] (it is about 1.35 M☉).
Distance
Currently, the most accurate distance estimate of V1054 Ophiuchi/Gliese 643 (apart from weighted mean distance, see below) is a trigonometric parallax of V1054 Ophiuchi AB from Gaia EDR3, published in 2020:[2]153.8754±0.0474mas, corresponding to a distance of 6.499±0.002pc, or 21.196±0.007ly.
This section needs to be updated. The reason given is: The system has parallaxes from Gaia now. Please help update this article to reflect recent events or newly available information.(December 2021)
Weighted mean parallax,[17] considering YPC (V1054 Ophiuchi A-Bab and Gliese 643), Hipparcos (Soederhjelm — V1054 Ophiuchi A-Bab and van Leeuwen — Gliese 643) and CTIOPI (V1054 Ophiuchi C) data, is 154.96 ± 0.52 mas,[18] corresponding to a distance 6.453 ± 0.022 pc, or 21.05 ± 0.07 ly.
V1054 Ophiuchi A-Bab (inner triple subsystem)
V1054 Ophiuchi A-Bab is a close spectroscopic triple subsystem, consisting of the brighter component V1054 Ophiuchi A and the more massive binary subsystem V1054 Ophiuchi Bab, orbiting each other with a period of 627 days,[4][3] or 1.72 years.[3] V1054 Ophiuchi Bab components are orbiting each other with a period of 2.9655 days.[4][3] Both outer and inner orbits are nearly circular and, probably, coplanar[4][3] (in
keeping with a general tendency of close triple systems).[4]
V1054 Ophiuchi A-Bab pair is also visually resolved (for nearly 50 years it was the shortest-period resolved by visual means binary, since its binarity was discovered by G. P. Kuiper in 1934),[3] whereas V1054 Ophiuchi Ba-Bb pair is still unresolved).[4][3][note 6]
Distant components
Gliese 643
The projected separation of Gliese 643 from V1054 Ophiuchi A-Bab is 72 arcsec,[4] corresponding at 21.05 light-years to 465 a.u.
V1054 Ophiuchi C (vB 8)
vB 8 is the smallest, faintest, and most separated component of the V1054 Ophiuchi system. The projected separation of the red dwarf from the primary triple system is about 220 arcsec,[4][3] corresponding at 21.05 light-years to 1420 a.u. Since it is only three times larger than the projected separation between Gliese 643 and V1054 Ophiuchi A-Bab, and such a small ratio should render the triple system dynamically unstable, it was suggested[3] that the real separation of V1054 Ophiuchi C from V1054 Ophiuchi A-Bab is much larger, at least by a factor of two,[3] i. e. at least 2840 a.u.
In 1984, the apparent detection of an infrared source near vB 8 suggested it had a low mass companion. The low mass of this candidate led to speculation that it may be a brown dwarf; the first such to be detected. This discovery was later found to be spurious, but it produced much interest in this class of astronomical object.[19]