Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
Below are lists of the largest stars currently known, ordered by radius and separated into categories by galaxy. The unit of measurement used is the radius of the Sun (approximately 695,700 km; 432,300 mi). [1] The Sun, the orbit of Earth, Jupiter, and Neptune, compared to four stars (Pistol Star, Rho Cassiopeiae, Betelgeuse, and VY Canis Majoris)
UY Scuti was analyzed to be the largest and the most luminous of the three stars measured, at 1,708 ± 192 R ☉ (1.188 × 10 9 ± 134,000,000 km; 7.94 ± 0.89 AU) based on an angular diameter of 5.48 ± 0.10 mas and an assumed distance of 2.9 ± 0.317 kiloparsecs (kpc) (about 9,500 ± 1,030 light-years) which was originally derived in 1970 ...
The largest of these may have a hydrostatic-equilibrium shape, but most are irregular. Most of the trans-Neptunian objects (TNOs) listed with a radius smaller than 200 km have " assumed sizes based on a generic albedo of 0.09" since they are too far away to directly measure their sizes with existing instruments.
A few notable large stars with masses less than 60 M ☉ are shown in the table below for the purpose of comparison, ending with the Sun, which is very close, but would otherwise be too small to be included in the list. At present, all the listed stars are naked-eye visible and relatively nearby.
VY Canis Majoris (abbreviated to VY CMa) is an extreme oxygen-rich red hypergiant or red supergiant (O-rich RHG or RSG) and pulsating variable star 1.2 kiloparsecs (3,900 light-years) from the Solar System in the slightly southern constellation of Canis Major.
To help try to put that into perspective, here are 10 of the biggest things of the universe in order of smallest to largest: ... That makes it 1,650 times as large as the sun. If you put it at the ...
The Sun is currently 5–30 parsecs (16–98 ly) above, or north of, the central plane of the Galactic disk. [104] The distance between the local arm and the next arm out, the Perseus Arm, is about 2,000 parsecs (6,500 ly). [105] The Sun, and thus the Solar System, is located in the Milky Way's galactic habitable zone. [106] [107]
The Sun is 1.4 million kilometers (4.643 light-seconds) wide, about 109 times wider than Earth, or four times the Lunar distance, and contains 99.86% of all Solar System mass. The Sun is a G-type main-sequence star that makes up about 99.86% of the mass of the Solar System. [26]