nova

• POS: Noun
• HYPHEN: no=va

CIDE DICTIONARY

nova, n. [L., fem. sing. of novus new.].

 A star which suddenly increases in brightness thousands of times, then fades back to near its original intensity. It may appear as a “new” star if its original brightness was too low for routine observation. A star which suddenly increases in brightness to many millions of times its original intensity is a supernova, and the postulated mechanisms for the increases of brightness of novae and supernovae are different.
"The most important modern novæ are: -- ∥No"va Co*ro"næ Bo`re*a"lis ( [1866]; ∥No"va Cyg"ni ( [1876]; ∥No"va An*dro"me*dæ ( [1885]; ∥No"va Au*ri"gæ ( [1891-92]; ∥No"va Per"se*i ( [1901]. There are two novæ called Nova Persei. They are: (a) A small nova which appeared in 1881. (b) An extraordinary nova which appeared in Perseus in 1901. It was first sighted on February 22, and for one night (February 23) was the brightest star in the sky. By July it had almost disappeared, after which faint surrounding nebulous masses were discovered, apparently moving radially outward from the star at incredible velocity."  [Webster 1913 Suppl.]

OXFORD DICTIONARY

nova, n. (pl. novae or novas) a star showing a sudden large increase of brightness and then subsiding.

Etymology

L, fem. of novus new, because orig. thought to be a new star

THESAURUS

nova

Beehive, Cepheid variable, Hertzsprung-Russell diagram, Hyades, Messier catalog, NGC, Pleiades, Seven Sisters, absolute magnitude, binary star, black hole, double star, dwarf star, fixed star, giant star, globular cluster, gravity star, magnitude, main sequence star, mass-luminosity law, neutron star, open cluster, populations, pulsar, quasar, quasi-stellar radio source, radio star, red giant star, relative magnitude, sky atlas, spectrum-luminosity diagram, star, star catalog, star chart, star cloud, star cluster, stellar magnitude, supernova, variable star, white dwarf star