multiple star

American  

noun

Astronomy.

1. three or more stars lying close together in the celestial sphere and usually united in a single gravitational system.

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multiple star British  

noun

1. a system of three or more stars associated by gravitation See also binary star

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multiple star Scientific  

1. A system of three or more stars that are bound together by gravity and orbit a common center of mass. The group generally appears as a single star to the naked eye. Astronomers believe that most stars in the universe are part of multiple or binary systems. Alpha Centauri, the closest star to our Sun, is a multiple star system containing three bodies.

2. See also binary star

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Etymology

Origin of multiple star

First recorded in 1840–50

Example Sentences

“Her ability to stretch the floor — being a 40% three-point shooter — and her size. You saw what she did defending multiple star players in the postseason.”

From Seattle Times • Apr. 15, 2024

In the Science Fiction Novella “Nightfall”, Isaac Asimov postulates how a civilization would face a solar eclipse in a multiple star solar system that only experienced night once every two thousand years.

From Salon • Apr. 11, 2024

Researchers have spied this sort of structure before—in WR 104 and Apep, both of which are multiple star systems with a Wolf-Rayet component.

From Scientific American • Oct. 25, 2022

Roughly half of the time, the protostar will fragment or be gravitationally bound to other protostars, forming a binary or multiple star system—stars that are gravitationally bound and orbit each other.

From Textbooks • Oct. 13, 2016

Most stars in the sky are members of double or multiple star systems.

From "Cosmos" by Carl Sagan