by 
ryanwh
ANSWERS: 3
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The sun is the nearest star from Earth.
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The Sun.
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Sol. The sun. But I know what you wanted to find out. The second closest is proxima centauri. Centauri is a ternary system, containing 3 stars known as alpha centauri A, alpha centauri B, and proxima. Why not alpha, beta and gamma I don't know, but proxima it is. It is my understanding that at the moment proxima the closest, though if they're all in a distant orbit about each other, eventually one of the others will be closest and then it will change again. I don't know what the period is but I'm sure it's many, many thousands of years. Well, it wouldn't be a single period, being a 3-body problem. But the two alpha centauri stars are much closer together and a whole tenth of a light-year away from proxima.
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