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During a star's evolution, convective mixing episodes moves material, within which the CNO cycle has operated, from the star's interior to the surface, altering the observed composition of the star. Red giant stars are observed to have lower carbon-12/carbon-13 and carbon-12/nitrogen-14 ratios than do main sequence stars, which is considered to ...
12 C, a stable isotope of carbon, is abundantly produced in stars due to three factors: The decay lifetime of a 8 Be nucleus is four orders of magnitude larger than the time for two 4 He nuclei (alpha particles) to scatter. [18] An excited state of the 12 C nucleus exists a little (0.3193 MeV) above the energy level of 8 Be + 4 He.
The difference in energy production of this cycle, compared to the proton–proton chain reaction, is accounted for by the energy lost through neutrino emission. [22] CNO cycle is highly sensitive to temperature, with rates proportional to T^{16-20}, a 10% rise of temperature would produce a 350% rise in energy production.
The energy released by this reaction is in millions of electron volts. Each individual reaction produces only a tiny amount of energy, but because enormous numbers of these reactions occur constantly, they produce all the energy necessary to sustain the star's radiation output. In comparison, the combustion of two hydrogen gas molecules with ...
The observable universe contains as many as an estimated 2 trillion galaxies [36] [37] [38] and, overall, as many as an estimated 10 24 stars [39] [40] – more stars (and, potentially, Earth-like planets) than all the grains of beach sand on planet Earth. [41] [42] [43] Other estimates are in the hundreds of billions rather than trillions.
Representative lifetimes of stars as a function of their masses The change in size with time of a Sun-like star Artist's depiction of the life cycle of a Sun-like star, starting as a main-sequence star at lower left then expanding through the subgiant and giant phases, until its outer envelope is expelled to form a planetary nebula at upper right Chart of stellar evolution A mass-radius plot ...
Comparison of main sequence stars of each spectral class. By treating the star as an idealized energy radiator known as a black body, the luminosity L and radius R can be related to the effective temperature T eff by the Stefan–Boltzmann law: = where σ is the Stefan–Boltzmann constant. As the position of a star on the HR diagram shows its ...
K-type main-sequence stars are about three to four times as abundant as G-type main-sequence stars, making planet searches easier. [17] K-type stars emit less total ultraviolet and other ionizing radiation than G-type stars like the Sun (which can damage DNA and thus hamper the emergence of nucleic acid based life). In fact, many peak in the red.