Tag Archives | star

Video Of China’s ‘Two Suns’ Unexplained By Scientists

By on March 7, 2011 in News 4
Sun

Photo:Yan Zhang (CC)

Two suns were seen setting in the China sky. Videos of the sight have baffled scientists  after an earlier report was ridiculed warning of a nearby star explosion that would appear to be another sun. Could there really be another sun-like star or is it just an optical illusion? Via Mother Nature Network:

Weeks after a story shot across the Web claiming that the imminent explosion of a nearby star would result in the appearance of a second sun in the sky – a story that was later debunked – two suns were caught on camera yesterday in China. The suns – one fuzzy and orange, the other a crisp yellow orb – appeared side-by-side, one slightly higher than the other.

What’s going on? Life’s Little Mysteries, a sister site to Space.com, asked Jim Kaler, the University of Illinois astronomer who squelched the excitement over the aforementioned exploding Betelgeuse and who has written books on the day and night sky.

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Star Found 265 Times Heavier Than Our Sun

By on July 21, 2010 in News 0

A cluster of stars recently photographed at the European Southern Observatory is found to be much larger, brighter and hotter than our humble Sun. R136a1 is said to be the largest star ever recorded.  The New York Times details:

A huge ball of brightly burning gas drifting through a neighboring galaxy may be the heaviest star ever discovered — hundreds of times more massive than the sun, scientists said Wednesday after working out its weight for the first time.

Those behind the find say the star, called R136a1, may once have weighed as much as 320 solar masses. Astrophysicist Paul Crowther said the obese star — twice as heavy as any previously discovered — has already slimmed down considerably over its lifetime.

In fact, it’s burning itself off with such intensity that it shines at nearly 10 million times the luminosity of the sun.

“Unlike humans, these stars are born heavy and lose weight as they age,” said Crowther, an astrophysicist at the University of Sheffield in northern England.

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