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Surface Plume On Betelgeuse Imaged

Posted by Soulskill on from the it-looks-hungry dept.

BJ_Covert_Action writes "Astronomy Now is running a piece regarding some new, exquisitely detailed pictures taken of Betelgeuse, a star in the constellation Orion. Betelgeuse is classified as a supergiant star, and its diameter is approximately 1,000 times that of the sun. Two teams of astronomers used ESO's 'Very large Telescope,' its NACO instruments, and an imaging technique known as 'Lucky Imaging' to take some of the most detailed pictures of Betelgeuse to date. The new pictures reveal a gas plume on Betelgeuse which extends from the surface of the star a distance greater than that between our sun and Neptune. The images also show several other 'boiling' spots on the surface of Betelgeuse, revealing the surface to be quite tumultuous. Currently, it is known that stars of Betelgeuse's size eject the equivalent mass of the Earth into space every year. This recent astronomy work will help researchers determine the mechanics behind such ejections." Update — 8/05 at 13:31 by SS: Here's the original press release from the European Southern Observatory, since the Astronomy Now page has slowed to a crawl.

12 of 51 comments (clear)

  1. FP by El+Torico · · Score: 3, Funny

    First plume!

    --
    In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is usually crucified.
  2. Obligatory by iveygman · · Score: 2, Funny

    Betelgeuse, Betelgeuse, Betelgeuse!

  3. Artist's impression? by g5g5g5 · · Score: 5, Funny

    If we just obtained the most detail picture evar, why do they show an artist's impression?

    1. Re:Artist's impression? by Bemopolis · · Score: 3, Informative

      Welcome to astronomy!

      --
      "I guess the moral of the story is, don't paint your airship with rocket fuel." -- Addison Bain
    2. Re:Artist's impression? by noundi · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Short answer: People are idiots.

      Long answer: Since the picture taken isn't very appealing for the general population such a headline might be confusing and in the end disappointing for the common reader. In order to reach out to the masses one needs to compromise so that anyone, besides astronomers or those interested in astronomy, can find it interesting. While ESO published the artists picture as well it seems that other news publishers have chosen to focus on it rather than providing it as an insightful interpretation to what the star might look like. Since the picture is undoubtly beautiful it will most likely spread faster and wider than the story would alone, giving the story a chance to hitch a ride on this fame. Naturally this means more advertisement exposure for the news sites that published the story resulting in additional revenue.

      --
      I am the lawn!
    3. Re:Artist's impression? by tnk1 · · Score: 2, Funny

      I heard that Betelgeuse actually had a decent ERA last season. It'll make the All-Star team for sure!

    4. Re:Artist's impression? by Alzheimers · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Who cares? Everyone knows that he's on the Geuse anyway.

      Ban a-Steroids!

    5. Re:Artist's impression? by khellendros1984 · · Score: 2, Interesting

      If I've done the calculations correctly, then Pluto appears somewhat larger in the sky than Betelgeuse. Since I can't don't have a source with Betelgeuse's angular size listed....

      Betelgeuse:
      6.05473818 Ã-- 10^18m (distance from earth)
      1 302.912x10^9 (diameter in meters)

      4647081.45 (distance per diameter)

      The Sun:
      1.496Ã--10^11 m (distance from earth)
      31.6â â" 32.7â (angular size in arc-minutes)
      1.392Ã--10^9 m (diameter)

      107.47 (distance per diameter)

      So, Betelgeuse appears 43240.22 times smaller than the sun, from earth. Given the Sun's apparent size in the sky, Betelgeuse is about 0.0438 arc-seconds in size, which is smaller than Pluto's (0.065" to 0.115").

      --
      It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue.
  4. Working link by MutantEnemy · · Score: 4, Informative

    This appears to be a more useful link:

    http://www.eso.org/public/outreach/press-rel/pr-2009/pr-27-09.html

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    Grr! Arg!
  5. Astronomy Picture of the Day by DaPh00z · · Score: 4, Informative

    You can view this image and many other interesting photos at the Astronomy Picture of the Day website. http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap090805.html

  6. Re:Be careful with the photos by Zixx · · Score: 2, Informative

    Nah, VLT has much better resolution than Hubble, something like a factor of 3 at near infra-red. Adaptive optics FTW.

  7. Syreens by molnarcs · · Score: 2, Funny

    *Yawn* Wake me up when you got a picture of the Syreen station orbiting Betelgeuse.