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The companion star "has an estimated mass of about 1.5 times that of the Sun and appears to be an A- or B-type main pre-sequence star, i.e. a hot, young, bluish
by chasil 1y ago
The companion star "has an estimated mass of about 1.5 times that of the Sun and appears to be an A- or B-type main pre-sequence star, i.e. a hot, young, bluish-white star that has not yet begun to burn hydrogen in its core... The companion is located at a relatively close distance to Betelgeuse, about 4 times the distance between Earth and the Sun. This discovery is the first time a stellar companion has been detected orbiting so close to a red supergiant star. Even more surprising is that the companion orbits inside Betelgeuse's outer atmosphere."
- pixl97 1y agoAlso >This discovery provides a clearer picture of this red supergiant’s life and future death. Betelgeuse and its companion star were likely born at the same time. However, the companion star will have a shortened lifespan as strong tidal forces will cause it to spiral into Betelgeuse and meet its demise, which scientists estimate will occur within the next 10,000 years. It's unfortunate our flesh lasts but a blink of cosmic time. That would be something to witness.
- adastra22 1y agoWe should fix that.
- colechristensen 1y ago>It's unfortunate our flesh lasts but a blink of cosmic time. That would be something to witness. My preferred solution to the Fermi paradox is that hundred million year long lifespans become trivial relatively soon at which point sublight speed galactic travel becomes no big deal and the differing time scale means that not being contacted by an alien intelligence simply hasn't happened yet, have you tried to establish communication with an ant hill in the last 10 seconds? Everybody else in the galaxy who could talk to us lives so long that they just haven't tried to say hello in the last 10,000 years because they were out to lunch.
- ofcrpls 1y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yuga_cycle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yuga_cycle
- tristramb 1y agoThere are many other red supergiants in the sky, some of which have long secondary periods that could be due to close-in companion stars. For example Mu Cephei has a 12 year periodicity.
- AStonesThrow 1y ago[dead]