Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Three Largest Stars Identified

Posted by timothy on from the larry-curly-and-moe dept.

mOoZik writes "BBC News is reporting that astronomers have identified the three biggest stars known to science, having diameters of more than 1.5 billion km. If they were located in the same place as our own Sun - at the centre of the Solar System - the stars would stretch out further than the orbit of Jupiter!"

8 of 354 comments (clear)

  1. just wondering by adamruck · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Why wouldn't these huge starts turn into black holes?

    --
    Selling software wont make you money, selling a service will.
    1. Re:just wondering by Phil+Urich · · Score: 2, Interesting

      ah, apparently you beat me to it. That's pretty much the point; speaking of, that's why our sun won't be going supernova, right? My knowledge is a bit far in the past, now, but I remember learning at some point that the eventual fate that our Sun will endure, ie. swelling out into a red giant or something of that like, then shrinking down and simmering out its final cold years as a white dwarf, is entirely related to exactly that: it's a medium density star, thus it will last a rather average time, and end "not with a bang, but a whimper".

      Ah, Sol, bastion of mediocrity. Without which, of course, conditions wouldn't've let us live so comfortably on this rock!

      --
      I remember sigs. Oh, a simpler time!
    2. Re:just wondering by Sterling+Christensen · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Can a star really be that thin? Doesn't its own gravity dictate a minimum density to maintain that volume?

    3. Re:just wondering by techno-vampire · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Alas, there are no green stars. Even if their temperature is such that their radiation peaks there, green has such a narrow band of frequencies that either yellow or blue will always predominate.

      --
      Good, inexpensive web hosting
    4. Re:just wondering by LuxFX · · Score: 2, Interesting

      ditto! I have always been curious and dissappointed about the lack of pretty emerald stars.

      fortunately, since moving to the midwest (Kansas City) and seeing the sun set over flat land instead of the mountains where I used to live, I have now seen sunsets with discernable green bands in them. That was my other hope for green.

      Now, if I can just witness a green flash sometime....

      --
      Punctanym: alternate spelling of words using punctuation or numerals in place of some or all of its letters; see 'leet'
  2. Betelguese! Betelguese! Betelguese! by Ralph+Spoilsport · · Score: 2, Interesting
    they had a picture of Betelguese! there, but only the vaguest idea as to when it's supposed to blow.

    Anyone heard ahything that way?

    I've heard anything from tomorrow afternoon to 2 milion years. I've heard it's been getting increasingly variable since 1940.

    If it goes supernova (and it's WAY big enough) what would be the results here? Genetic disorders? Extinction? Has anyone done the math on this?

    RS

    --
    Shoes for Industry. Shoes for the Dead.
  3. Non Red Giants by bobobobo · · Score: 2, Interesting

    It would be interesting to find the largest non-red giant stars. As once our own sun turns into a red giant, it's radius is supposed to extend out past Jupiter as well.

  4. Largest? by marevan · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't red giants dencity pretty low? So when a star transforms into a red giant, it's bound to get much larger. So wouldn't it be cooler to find actually non-dying star of this magnitude?

    (Well definetly not cooler)