What does an array with a * mean? [duplicate]

Question

I tried searching for this, but see below:

Array
(
[*response] => Array
    (
        [body] => 

What does it mean if response has an asterisk before it?

Answer 1

I believe that means it is a protected variable.

If an object is converted to an array, the result is an array whose elements are the object's properties. The keys are the member variable names, with a few notable exceptions: integer properties are unaccessible; private variables have the class name prepended to the variable name; protected variables have a '*' prepended to the variable name. These prepended values have null bytes on either side.

(Source)