Stars Archives

July 18, 2024July 18, 2024 by Carolyn Collins Petersen

Stars Can Survive Their Partner Detonating as a Supernova

A binary star system consisting of two stars: a dense neutron star (lower right) and a normal Sun-like star (upper left). The neutron star formed in a supernova explosion and the Sun-like star survived it. Credit: Caltech/R. Hurt (IPAC)

When a massive star dies in a supernova explosion, it’s not great news for any planets or stars that happen to be nearby. Generally, the catastrophic event crisps nearby worlds and sends companion stars careening through space. So, astronomers were pretty surprised to find 21 neutron stars—the crushed stellar cores left over after supernova explosions—orbiting in binary systems with Sun-like stars.

June 25, 2024June 25, 2024 by Evan Gough

Do We Now Have an Accurate Map of Nearby Stars?

This image shows the bright stars within 15 parsecs of the Sun. If red dwarfs and brown dwarfs were included, there would be far more stars. But those stars are difficult to spot. Have we found all of them yet? Image Credit: By Andrew Z. Colvin - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=14359465

If the Sun has a stellar neighbourhood, it can be usefully defined as a 20 parsec (65 light-years) sphere centred on our star. Astronomers have been actively cataloguing the stellar population in the neighbourhood for decades, but it hasn’t been easy since many stars are small and dim.

Even with all of the challenges inherent in the effort, astronomers have made steady progress. Do we now have a complete catalogue?

June 21, 2024June 21, 2024 by Evan Gough

The JWST Peers into the Heart of Star Formation

In this image of the Serpens Nebula from the Near-InfraRed Camera (NIRCam) on the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope, astronomers found a grouping of aligned protostellar outflows within one small region (the top left corner). In the Webb image, these jets are identified by bright red clumpy streaks, which are shockwaves caused when the jet hits the surrounding gas and dust. Image Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, K. Pontoppidan (NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory), J. Green (Space Telescope Science Institute)

The James Webb Space Telescope has unlocked another achievement. This time, the dynamic telescope has peered into the heart of a nearby star-forming region and imaged something astronomers have longed to see: aligned bipolar jets.

June 11, 2024June 11, 2024 by Evan Gough

The Nearby Star Clusters Come from Only Three Places

The most well-known open cluster is probably the Pleiades, or Seven Sisters. The Japanese call it the Subaru cluster, and keen observers might recognize its pattern on the Subaru automobile logo. New research shows that the Pleiades and more than 150 other star clusters all originated in only three star-forming regions. Image: By NASA, ESA, AURA/Caltech, Palomar Observatory. http://hubblesite.org/newscenter/archive/releases/2004/20/image/a/, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=7805481

Many astronomy-interested people know of the Hyades and the Pleiades. They’re star clusters in the Taurus constellation. They’re two out of a handful of star clusters that are visible to the unaided eye under dark sky conditions.

It turns out that these clusters, along with more than 150 other nearby clusters, all originated in only three massive star-forming regions.

June 7, 2024June 7, 2024 by Mark Thompson

We’re Now Just Weeks Away from a Stellar Explosion You Can See With Your Own Eyes

I’ve seen some pretty incredible things using my eyes.. First off of course, is the stunning sight of a dark star filled sky, then there is the incredible sight of the Andromeda Galaxy 2.5 million light years away. Planets too can of course be seen as they slowly move across the sky but it’s a little more unusual to see something that reminds us the Universe changes. Well, we have an opportunity in just a few weeks time. The star T Corona Borealis (T CrB) will brighten about 1,500 times so it can be seen with the unaided eye. Miss it though and you will have to wait another 80 years!

May 29, 2024May 29, 2024 by Evan Gough

Sorry Spock, But “Vulcan” Isn’t a Planet After All

This artist's illustration shows the exoplanet Eridani b, aka Vulcan, home of Star Trek's Commander Spock. Unfortunately, evidence is mounting that the planet isn't really there. Image Credit: JPL-Caltech

In 2018, astronomers detected an exoplanet around the star 40 Eridani. It’s about 16 light-years away in the constellation Eridanus. The discovery generated a wave of interest for a couple of reasons. Not only is it the closest Super-Earth around a star similar to our Sun, but the star system is the fictional home of Star Trek’s Vulcan science officer, Mr. Spock.

It’s always fun when a real science discovery lines up with science fiction.

May 15, 2024May 15, 2024 by Evan Gough

A Star Became 1,000 Times Brighter, and Now Astronomers Know Why

Artist’s impression of one of the two stars in the FU Orionis binary system, surrounded by an accreting disk of material. What has caused this star — and others like it — to dramatically brighten? [NASA/JPL-Caltech] — Artist’s impression of one of the two stars in the FU Orionis binary system, surrounded by an accreting disk of material. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

Astronomers were surprised in 1937 when a star in a binary pair suddenly brightened by 1,000 times. The pair is called FU Orionis (FU Ori), and it’s in the constellation Orion. The sudden and extreme variability of one of the stars has resisted a complete explanation, and since then, FU Orionis has become the name for other stars that exhibit similar powerful variability.

May 15, 2024May 15, 2024 by Mark Thompson

Three of the Oldest Stars in the Universe Found Circling the Milky Way

MIT astronomers discovered three of the oldest stars in the universe, and they live in our own galactic neighborhood. The stars are in the Milky Way’s “halo” — the cloud of stars that envelopes the main galactic disk — and they appear to have formed between 12 and 13 billion years ago, when the very first galaxies were taking shape. Credits:Image: Serge Brunier; NASA

Mention the Milky Way and most people will visualise a great big spiral galaxy billions of years old. It’s thought to be a galaxy that took shape billions of years after the Big Bang. Studies by astronomers have revealed that there are the echo’s of an earlier time around us. A team of astronomers from MIT have found three ancient stars orbiting the Milky Way’s halo. The team think these stars formed when the Universe was around a billion years old and that they were once part of a smaller galaxy that was consumed by the Milky Way.

April 30, 2024April 30, 2024 by Evan Gough

Binary Stars Form in the Same Nebula But Aren’t Identical. Now We Know Why.

This artist’s impression illustrates a binary pair of giant stars. Despite being born from the same molecular cloud, astronomers often detect differences in binary stars’ chemical compositions and planetary systems. Image Credit: NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/J. da Silva (Spaceengine)/M. Zamani

It stands to reason that stars formed from the same cloud of material will have the same metallicity. That fact underpins some avenues of astronomical research, like the search for the Sun’s siblings. But for some binary stars, it’s not always true. Their composition can be different despite forming from the same reservoir of material, and the difference extends to their planetary systems.

New research shows that the differences can be traced back to their earliest stages of formation.

April 30, 2024April 30, 2024 by Evan Gough

Astronomers Think They’ve Found Examples of the First Stars in the Universe

An artist's illustration of some of the Universe's first stars. Called Population 3 stars, they formed a few hundred million years after the Big Bang. Image Credit: By NASA/WMAP Science Team - https://www.nasa.gov/vision/universe/starsgalaxies/fuse_fossil_galaxies.html (image link), Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1582286

When the first stars in the Universe formed, the only material available was primordial hydrogen and helium from the Big Bang. Astronomers call these original stars Population Three stars, and they were extremely massive, luminous, and hot stars. They’re gone now, and in fact, their existence is hypothetical.

But if they did exist, they should’ve left their fingerprints on nearby gas, and astrophysicists are looking for it.