Scientifically Orion Constellation: If you go outside in winter, you will see the favorite constellation of astronomers in the sky, its name is Orion constellation. Scientifically there are many interesting stars in Orion Constellation, one of which is Betelgeuse. This star is located on the shoulder of Orion and it is a radish type star. Its name is from Arabic Epl-Jalsa which means arm pit of Orion. And now his nickname is Betelgeuse Star. Whatever the name, it’s a star that we astronomers reckon could explode anytime within the next few years.
Betelgeuse Star
The mass of Betelgeuse star is 20 times that of our sun. Such stars use up their fuel extremely fast. By fuel, we mean the rapid fusion of hydrogen to helium and then a supernova explosion, which is the largest explosion in our universe. As you can see in the picture.
Now Betelgeuse is about 650 light years away from us, but many stars in our sky are much closer, but Betelgeuse is still in the top 10 stars in terms of brightness and its age is 8.5 million years. Betelgeuse has already fused its hydrogen into helium. In comparison, our own sun has already been fusing hydrogen into helium for 4.5 billion years, and our sun will continue to fuse hydrogen into helium for another 4.5 billion years.
Betelgeuse 8.5 billion years has already become a red super giant star and its size is so big that if you place Betelgeuse today in the place of our sun, in its radius Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Asteroid belt and most probably Jupiter will come means all of them will be inside Betelgeuse star. It is an extremely massive star that we believe is in the last stages of its life, which is why Betelgeuse is so interesting to us.
Betelgeuse star continues to be monitored to see what will happen in that star. What we see today in that star is actually what we are seeing 650 light years past.
A few years ago it was found that Betelgeuse dimmed a bit and then after two months it dimmed again which is why if we go out and look at the sky today, Betelgeuse is in the top 20 stars. This then means that the Betelgeuse star is about to explode (supernova).
Now let me tell you a little disappointing thing that actually Betelgeuse star is not going supernova but why its dimming is decreasing, so I don’t know the answer, but astronomers think that this dimming is a regular phenomenon of Betelgeuse star. There is periodic dimming. Betelgeuse is one of those stars that we call variable stars that are regularly dim and bright.
The momentum cycle of Betelgeuse is one of 2000 days which is about 6 and another cycle which is about 400 days which is equal to 1 year 23 months. So from here it is assumed that what we are seeing now is unusual dimming because these two cycles have merged with each other due to which they are unusually dim but this is not confirmed. We can’t even say for sure if it’s the same or not because we’re seeing Betelgeuse’s dimming so low for the first time.
Another thing is that it is in its final stages where the stars eject their gases. Betelgeuse has already ejected a lot of gas. This is the picture you are looking at.
In this image you can see that Betelgeuse is ejecting some material. It can clearly be seen that Betelgeuse and that material are moving in the same direction and we are seeing its Bow Shock.
This material was ejected by Betelgeuse and is now interacting with the interstellar medium or other material gases. Here is the explanation of this dimming that the gases that Betelgeuse star ejected, some of which must have become dense material dust, due to which the material prevented the light of Betelgeuse from reaching us, which made us think that Betelgeuse dimmed.
Importance of Betelgeuse Star
The important thing is that the evolution of Betelgeuse in some ways, we are constantly in time almost live watching such a big star that is 20 times more massive than our sun. How is it changing itself after 8.5 billion years? Although in astronomy we see the changes of a star in billions of years, but the changes of Betelgeuse star are seen almost every month.
The answer to this question is whether Betelgeuse will explode by today or not, but I and astronomers believe that Betelgeuse Star will explode for about one hundred thousand years.
