HD 203857
Encyclopedia
HD 203857 is a late type
Late-type star
In stellar classification, a late-type star is a star of class K or class M. The term was coined in the early 20th century, when there was a belief that stars began their history as early-type stars of class O, B, or A, and subsequently cooled to late-type stars....

 K giant star
Giant star
A giant star is a star with substantially larger radius and luminosity than a main sequence star of the same surface temperature. Typically, giant stars have radii between 10 and 100 solar radii and luminosities between 10 and 1,000 times that of the Sun. Stars still more luminous than giants are...

 in the constellation
Constellation
In modern astronomy, a constellation is an internationally defined area of the celestial sphere. These areas are grouped around asterisms, patterns formed by prominent stars within apparent proximity to one another on Earth's night sky....

 Cygnus
Cygnus (constellation)
Cygnus is a northern constellation lying on the plane of the Milky Way. Its name is the Latinized Hellenic word for swan. One of the most recognizable constellations of the northern summer and autumn, it features a prominent asterism known as the Northern Cross...

, located nearly 920 light years away from Sun
Sun
The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It is almost perfectly spherical and consists of hot plasma interwoven with magnetic fields...

. The star is thought to form a visual binary system with the F-type bright giant
Bright giant
The luminosity class II in the Yerkes spectral classification is given to bright giants. These are stars which straddle the boundary between giants and supergiants, and the classification is in general given to giant stars with exceptionally high luminosity, but which are not sufficiently bright...

 BDS 10966 A, though it's likely they are actually not gravitationally bound. The star likely hosts an extrasolar planet
Extrasolar planet
An extrasolar planet, or exoplanet, is a planet outside the Solar System. A total of such planets have been identified as of . It is now known that a substantial fraction of stars have planets, including perhaps half of all Sun-like stars...

, though yet unconfirmed.

Substellar companion

Okayama Planet Search team has published a paper in late 2008 reporting investigations on radial velocity variations observed for a set of evolved stars, announcing possible detection of a substellar companion orbiting the giant star HD 203857. Orbital period
Orbital period
The orbital period is the time taken for a given object to make one complete orbit about another object.When mentioned without further qualification in astronomy this refers to the sidereal period of an astronomical object, which is calculated with respect to the stars.There are several kinds of...

 is estimated 2.3 years, but planet has still to be confirmed.
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