Post by auntym on Apr 26, 2013 13:41:47 GMT -6
www.astronomy.com/en/News-Observing/News/2013/04/Mysterious%20hot%20spots%20observed%20in%20Betelgeuse.aspx
Mysterious hot spots observed in Betelgeuse
A new image of Betelgeuse, a nearby red supergiant, shows it has both hot spots and a giant arc of cool gas extending far beyond its atmosphere.
By Royal Astronomical Society, United Kingdom
Published: April 26, 2013
In this new image of the outer atmosphere of the red supergiant Betelgeuse, the colors represent brightness ranging from faintest (red) to brightest (white). The black circle represents the visual size of the star. // Royal Astronomical Society/e-MERLIN
Astronomers have released a new image of the outer atmosphere of Betelgeuse — one of the nearest red supergiants to Earth — revealing the detailed structure of the matter being thrown off the star.
The new image, taken by the e-MERLIN radio telescope array operated from the Jodrell Bank Observatory in Cheshire in the United Kingdom, also shows regions of surprisingly hot gas in the star's outer atmosphere and a cooler arc of gas weighing almost as much as the Earth.
Betelgeuse is easily visible to the unaided eye as the bright red star on the top left shoulder of Orion the Hunter. The star itself is huge — 1,000 times larger than our Sun — but at a distance of about 650 light-years, it still appears as a tiny dot in the sky, so to see details of the star and the region surrounding it, astronomers must combine telescopes in arrays.
The new image of Betelgeuse shows that its atmosphere extends out to five times the size of the visual surface of the star. It also reveals two hot spots within the outer atmosphere and a faint arc of cool gas even farther out beyond the radio surface of the star.
The hot spots appear on opposite sides of Betelgeuse, separated by about half the star’s visual diameter. They have a temperature of about 6700°–8500° Fahrenheit (3700°–4700° Celsius), much higher than the average temperature of the star’s radio surface (some 1700° F [930° C]) and even higher than the 6000° F (3300° C) visual surface. The arc of cool gas lies almost 4.5 million miles (7.4 billion kilometers) away from the star — about the same as Pluto’s farthest distance from the Sun. Scientists estimate the gas has a mass almost two-thirds that of the Earth and a temperature of only –190° F (–123° C).
CONTINUE READING: www.astronomy.com/en/News-Observing/News/2013/04/Mysterious%20hot%20spots%20observed%20in%20Betelgeuse.aspx
Mysterious hot spots observed in Betelgeuse
A new image of Betelgeuse, a nearby red supergiant, shows it has both hot spots and a giant arc of cool gas extending far beyond its atmosphere.
By Royal Astronomical Society, United Kingdom
Published: April 26, 2013
In this new image of the outer atmosphere of the red supergiant Betelgeuse, the colors represent brightness ranging from faintest (red) to brightest (white). The black circle represents the visual size of the star. // Royal Astronomical Society/e-MERLIN
Astronomers have released a new image of the outer atmosphere of Betelgeuse — one of the nearest red supergiants to Earth — revealing the detailed structure of the matter being thrown off the star.
The new image, taken by the e-MERLIN radio telescope array operated from the Jodrell Bank Observatory in Cheshire in the United Kingdom, also shows regions of surprisingly hot gas in the star's outer atmosphere and a cooler arc of gas weighing almost as much as the Earth.
Betelgeuse is easily visible to the unaided eye as the bright red star on the top left shoulder of Orion the Hunter. The star itself is huge — 1,000 times larger than our Sun — but at a distance of about 650 light-years, it still appears as a tiny dot in the sky, so to see details of the star and the region surrounding it, astronomers must combine telescopes in arrays.
The new image of Betelgeuse shows that its atmosphere extends out to five times the size of the visual surface of the star. It also reveals two hot spots within the outer atmosphere and a faint arc of cool gas even farther out beyond the radio surface of the star.
The hot spots appear on opposite sides of Betelgeuse, separated by about half the star’s visual diameter. They have a temperature of about 6700°–8500° Fahrenheit (3700°–4700° Celsius), much higher than the average temperature of the star’s radio surface (some 1700° F [930° C]) and even higher than the 6000° F (3300° C) visual surface. The arc of cool gas lies almost 4.5 million miles (7.4 billion kilometers) away from the star — about the same as Pluto’s farthest distance from the Sun. Scientists estimate the gas has a mass almost two-thirds that of the Earth and a temperature of only –190° F (–123° C).
CONTINUE READING: www.astronomy.com/en/News-Observing/News/2013/04/Mysterious%20hot%20spots%20observed%20in%20Betelgeuse.aspx