K star

noun

, Astronomy.

1. a relatively cool, orange-to-red star, as Aldebaran or Arcturus, having a surface temperature between 3500 and 5000 K and an absorption spectrum with strong lines of calcium and many neutral metals.

Example Sentences

The otherwise innocuous main sequence K star, and its surrounding planets, soon bloomed into a bright ring boosted by many orders of magnitude by the lensing of the Sun's gravitational field.

From Nature

This artist’s conception shows the Uranus-sized exoplanet Kepler-421b, which orbits an orange, type K star about 1,000 light-years from Earth.

From Forbes

The newest addition to the catalogue, Kepler 421b, orbits an orange, type K star that is cooler and dimmer than our own Sun and since it’s orbiting around 110 million miles out, it’s a fairly chilly world.

From Forbes

But then the continuing telescopic searches turned up a world that was orbiting beyond the nominal 'habitable zone' of a K star, but that was unaccountably warm.

From Nature

It was a night of mischief and business that included Ambiguous friends from SFO, FTC, K Star, and Villians drinking all the ambiguous kool aid they could consume in a single night.

From Time Magazine Archive