Space: Stars

Space

Space is a vast, seemingly endless void of darkness. Well, that’s not true, obviously. Our star, the Sun, isn’t one of the most interesting stars. In fact, it is way smaller than the largest star, UY Scuti. UY Scuti is the largest known star, with a diameter of 1.4 BILLION miles, it is 1,700 times larger than our Sun. UY Scuti is a red super-giant meaning that its life will be shorter than our Sun. This star, however, is not all that hot because of its size. At a temperature of 3,365K (kelvin), UY Scuti is actually about 2,000K cooler than our sun. Pretty crazy right? Well, that’s only a small fraction of the hottest known star.

Wolf-Rayet star WR 102 is the hottest known star at 210,000K. In Fahrenheit, that’s 377,540 degrees. Clearly, no human would want to go within a light year close to this star. I think that if you were so close as 1 billion miles to this star, you would instantly vaporize into ash. This star can only live for about 1 million years, and our Sun will probably live to be 7 – 8 billion years. That’s a star nobody would want to get close to.

Is our Sun the only star that has a habitable planet? Scientists think that we aren’t alone. Out of the billions of stars in our Universe, with more being created every passing day, there has to be another planet with the possibility of life. Scientists reported 40 BILLION Earth sized habitable planets. Most of these planets are called Kepler exoplanets, named after the space probe that made the discovery of them. Kepler played a crucial role in proving that we might not be alone after all. Of course, scientists aren’t expecting lifeforms as intelligent as us humans, more like bacteria and other microorganisms.

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If you liked this article, and if you love space, Ms. Groves also likes space and would probably love to talk with you about the Universe and all the incredible things about it, such as how the Universe is always growing bigger and bigger at the speed of light. Yes, it would be impossible to reach the edge of the Universe because of how fast it expands.

Thanks For Reading!

Photos

Wolf-Rayet 102

UY Scuti

Kepler 62f