{"id":17150,"date":"2024-03-20T09:48:15","date_gmt":"2024-03-20T09:48:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/2024\/03\/20\/explosive-star-event-will-create-once-in-a-lifetime-sight-in-the-sky-heres-how-to-see-it\/"},"modified":"2024-03-20T09:48:15","modified_gmt":"2024-03-20T09:48:15","slug":"explosive-star-event-will-create-once-in-a-lifetime-sight-in-the-sky-heres-how-to-see-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/2024\/03\/20\/explosive-star-event-will-create-once-in-a-lifetime-sight-in-the-sky-heres-how-to-see-it\/","title":{"rendered":"Explosive star event will create once-in-a-lifetime sight in the sky. Here\u2019s how to see it"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Astronomers are expecting a \u201cnew star\u201d to appear in the night sky anytime between now and September, and it promises to be a once-in-a-lifetime celestial sight, according to NASA. <\/p>\n

The expected brightening event, known as a nova, will occur in the Milky Way\u2019s Corona Borealis, or Northern Crown constellation, which is located between the Bo\u00f6tes and Hercules constellations. <\/p>\n

While a supernova is the explosive death of a massive star, a nova refers to the sudden, brief explosion from a collapsed star known as a white dwarf. <\/p>\n

T Coronae Borealis, otherwise known as the \u201cBlaze Star,\u201d is a binary system in the Corona Borealis that includes a dead white dwarf star and an aging red giant star. Red giants form when stars have exhausted their supply of hydrogen for nuclear fusion and begin to die. In about 5 billion or 6 billion years, our sun will become a red giant, puffing up and expanding as it releases layers of material and likely evaporating the solar system\u2019s inner planets, although Earth\u2019s fate remains unclear, according to NASA. <\/p>\n

Every 79 years or so, T Coronae Borealis experiences an explosive event. <\/p>\n

The stars in the orbiting pair are close enough to each other that they interact violently. The red giant becomes increasingly unstable over time as it heats up, casting off its outer layers that land as matter on the white dwarf star. <\/p>\n

The exchange of matter causes the atmosphere of the white dwarf to gradually heat until it experiences a \u201crunaway thermonuclear reaction,\u201d resulting in a nova as seen in the animation below, according to the space agency. <\/p>\n

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<\/div>\n
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<\/span>NASA Scientific Visualization Studio<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Keeping an eye on the changing sky<\/h3>\n

T Coronae Borealis last experienced an explosive outburst in 1946, and astronomers are keeping a watchful eye on the star system once more. <\/p>\n

\u201cMost novae happen unexpectedly, without warning,\u201d said William J. Cooke, NASA Meteoroid Environments Office lead, in an email. \u201cHowever, T Coronae Borealis is one of 10 recurring novae in the galaxy. We know from the last eruption back in 1946 that the star will get dimmer for just over a year before rapidly increasing in brightness. T Coronae Borealis began to dim in March of last year, so some researchers are expecting it to go nova between now and September. But the uncertainty as to when this will happen is several months \u2014 can\u2019t do better than that with what we know now.\u201d <\/p>\n

The star system, located 3,000 light-years from Earth and typically too dim to be seen with the naked eye, is expected to reach a level of brightness similar to that of Polaris, or the North Star. <\/p>\n

Once the nova peaks in brightness, it will be as if a new star has appeared \u2014 one that\u2019s visible for a few days without any equipment and a little over a week with binoculars before it dims and disappears from sight for another 80 years or so. <\/p>\n

The nova will appear in a small arc between the Bo\u00f6tes and Hercules constellations, and will be visible from the Northern Hemisphere. <\/p>\n

Astronomers will observe the nova using the Hubble Space Telescope and study the celestial event through X-ray and ultraviolet light using the space-based Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory. <\/p>\n

\u201cStudying recurring novae like T Coronae Borealis help us understand the mass transfer between the stars in these systems and provide insights into the thermonuclear runaway that occurs on the surface of the white dwarf when the star goes nova,\u201d Cooke said. <\/p>\n

The NASAUniverse account on X, formerly known as Twitter, will provide updates about the outburst and its appearance. <\/p>\n

Cooke recalled that the last nova he witnessed \u2014 Nova Cygni in 1975 \u2014 had a similar brightness to what is expected from T Coronae Borealis. Nova Cygni is not expected to experience another explosion again. <\/p>\n

\u201cI was a teenage astronomy geek about to start college and was outside on the night of August 29,\u201d Cooke said. \u201cGlancing at the sky, I noticed that the constellation of Cygnus was messed up; there was a star that shouldn\u2019t be there. After enduring some comments from friends who thought I was crazy, I got them to look and we realized that we were looking at a nova! It was a very memorable experience and reinforced my choice of astronomy as a career. I used to joke that a star had to explode in order to get me to suffer through undergraduate physics.\u201d <\/p>\n\n

This post appeared first on cnn.com<\/div>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Astronomers are expecting a \u201cnew star\u201d to appear in the night sky anytime between now and September, and it promises to be a once-in-a-lifetime celestial sight, according to NASA. The expected brightening event, known as a nova, will occur in the Milky Way\u2019s Corona Borealis, or Northern Crown constellation, which is located between the Bo\u00f6tes <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":17151,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-17150","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17150","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17150"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17150\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17151"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17150"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17150"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17150"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}