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More than 100 OB and Wolf–Rayet stars have been identified there so far. [47] They seem to have all been formed in a single star formation event a few million years ago. The existence of these relatively young stars was a surprise to experts, who expected the tidal forces from the central black hole to prevent their formation. [48]
The closest encounter to the Sun so far predicted is the low-mass orange dwarf star Gliese 710 / HIP 89825 with roughly 60% the mass of the Sun. [4] It is currently predicted to pass 0.1696 ± 0.0065 ly (10 635 ± 500 au) from the Sun in 1.290 ± 0.04 million years from the present, close enough to significantly disturb the Solar System's Oort ...
Orion's Belt is an asterism in the constellation of Orion.Other names include the Belt of Orion, the Three Kings, and the Three Sisters. [1] The belt consists of three bright and easily identifiable collinear star systems – Alnitak, Alnilam, and Mintaka – nearly equally spaced in a line, spanning an angular size of ~ 140′ (2.3°).
This article documents the most distant astronomical objects discovered and verified so far, and the time periods in which they were so classified. For comparisons with the light travel distance of the astronomical objects listed below, the age of the universe since the Big Bang is currently estimated as 13.787±0.020 Gyr.
Orion's seven brightest stars form a distinctive hourglass-shaped asterism, or pattern, in the night sky. Four stars—Rigel, Betelgeuse, Bellatrix, and Saiph—form a large roughly rectangular shape, at the center of which lies the three stars of Orion's Belt—Alnitak, Alnilam, and Mintaka. His head is marked by an additional 8th star called ...
In August 2015, the largest recorded flares of the star occurred, with the star becoming 8.3 times brighter than normal on 13 August, in the B band (blue light region). [ 60 ] Alpha Centauri may be inside the G-cloud of the Local Bubble , [ 61 ] and its nearest known system is the binary brown dwarf system Luhman 16 , at 3.6 light-years (1.1 ...
The nearest star to the Earth, apart from the Sun, is Proxima Centauri, 4.2465 light-years (40.175 trillion kilometres) away. Travelling at the orbital speed of the Space Shuttle, 8 kilometres per second (29,000 kilometres per hour), it would take about 150,000 years to arrive. [120]
A multiple star system consists of two or more stars that appear from Earth to be close to one another in the sky. [dubious – discuss] This may result from the stars actually being physically close and gravitationally bound to each other, in which case it is a physical multiple star, or this closeness may be merely apparent, in which case it is an optical multiple star [a] Physical multiple ...