Approxiamtely 4.3 light years away
4.3 light years===========================Sorry. "Light year" is an answer to "how far", not "how long".Alpha Centauri is about 4.4 light years away from our solar system and everything in it,which means that it takes AC's light about 4.3 years to get here.
Alpha Centauri is a triple star system. Alpha Centauri A, B & C or Proxima Centauri. Alpha Centauri A & B are 4.37 light years from the Earth whereas Alpha Centauri C is 4.243 light years.
No; in fact, the Alpha Centauri system is the closest star system to Earth.The closest star to us is the Sun; the next-closest star is Proxima Centauri, part of the Alpha Centauri system.
The "alpha" is a star's nomenclature means it's (usually) the brightest star in its constellation. Even if the constellations are apparently close, the stars could be any distance, since the constellation is only the two-dimensional "window" and doesn't tell us anything about the depth of the starfield. However, Alpha Sagittarii is about 180 light years from Earth. Since this is much further away than Alpha Centauri, we can more or less ignore the 4 light year distance between Earth and Alpha Centauri and say that Alpha Sagittarii is also about 180 light years from Alpha Centauri as well.
Alpha Centauri (Rigil Kentaurus, Rigil Kent, or Toliman) is a binary star systemAlpha Centauri A is a G2 star or yellow dwarf - very similar to our own SunAlpha Centauri B is a K1 star or orange dwarf.and possibly a triple star system.Alpha Centauri C (Proxima Centauri) is a M5 star or red dwarfAlpha Centauri (Rigil Kentaurus) is the brightest star in the southern constellation of Centaurus. Although it appears to us as a single object, Alpha Centauri is actually a binary star system.Alpha Centauri A has a spectral type of G2V - so it is a yellow dwarf.Alpha Centauri B has a spectral type of G2V - so it is an orange dwarf.
Proxima Centauri is the closest star to our Sun, at 4.2 LY. Curiously, even though it is the closest, it is not visible to the naked eye! Proxima Centauri is a tiny red dwarf star, and requires a fair-sized telescope to see. For a long time, many people thought that the closest star was Alpha Centauri, which isn't entirely incorrect. The Alpha Centauri system is actually a double star with a very distant triple; Alpha Centauri A (also known as Rigel Kent) and Alpha Centauri B form a binary system, and Proxima, Alpha Centauri C, is very distantly linked at about 0.3 LY.
The closest star is our Sun at approximately 93 million miles. The next star is alpha Centauri at about 4.3 light years.
To my understanding, the Alpha Centauri system contains two binary stars (Alpha Centauri A and Alpha Centauri B) and a third star Alpha Centauri C or Proxima Centauri (which is the closest star to our sun)
The star closest to earth is the sun, at a distance of roughly 93 million miles.Light from the sun reaches us in a little over 8 minutes.The next closest star is Alpha Centauri, about 278,000 times farther away thanthe sun is. Light from Alpha Centauri travels for about 4.4 years to reach us.
Alpha Centauri is a binary (Possibly triple) star system.Alpha Centauri A/B is 4.37 light years from us.Alpha Centauri C is 4.243 light years from us.
Polaris (the North star - Alpha Ursae Minoris) is a triple star system, but appears to us as a single star. Alpha Centauri is also another triple star system. And there are many more.
Not counting the Sun itself, Proxima Centauri can be the nearest star that we know about.Proxima (Alpha Centauri C) is part of the Alpha Centauri system. Depending on where it is in its orbit, it might be closer to us than Alpha Centauri A and Alpha Centauri B, or it might be further away.Astronomers also aren't absolutely positive that the Sun doesn't have a distant binary red or brown dwarf companion. Such a companion would be difficult for us to detect. This hypothetical companion has even been given a name, just in case we end up finding it: Nemesis.It currently seems unlikely that Nemesis exists. The WISE survey (which could have detected stellar objects with a surface temperature of just 150 Kelvin - far below freezing - at a distance of 10 light years, considerably further away than the Alpha Centauri system) should have found it if it were there. Also, the reason it was originally hypothesized to exist (periodic mass extinctions on Earth, the reason for the name Nemesis) is no longer considered to be consistent with the proposed Nemesis mechanism.So, after all that: Probably yes, at least part of the time.