Betelgeuse is acting strange. Scientists have found a solution to this puzzle

The night sky contains many stars, some of which are very bright objects. She is at the forefront of these Betelgeuse. It is a red supergiant that is one of the brightest stars visible from Earth. Astronomers have noticed alarming anomalies in this object. What is this?

Betelgeuse has been showing changes in brightness for several years and thus attracts the attention of astronomers. They decided to make radio measurements of the change in light. They showed that The body can rotate at speeds of up to 5 km/swhich means very quickly.

Scientists have concluded that the process occurs very quickly. For Betelgeuse-type stars, this should happen at least twice as slowly. So what's going on there? A team led by astrophysicist Jing Zhima from the Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics in Germany has the answer to this question.

Scientists looked at the data they collected and concluded that Betelgeuse probably isn't rotating very fast. It can be analysis Incorrect and results from star disturbance. Its boiling surface Creates the illusion of rapid rotationBut this is just an illusion.

Betelgeuse is a large red giant star. If the body were placed in the solar system, the size would be It will almost reach the orbit of Jupiter. The star slowly runs out of fuel and swells to enormous sizes. In the indefinite future Explodes A similar fate will befall the Sun in a few billion years.

Betelgeuse's strange behavior is due to turbulent surface processes. We have similar objects on the Sun, but in the case of the large red giant, they take on incredible sizes. For example Convection cells can be as large as Earth's orbit! These types of stars still hide many secrets from us.

Studying stars like Betelgeuse more closely will allow us to better predict what the Sun will encounter in the future. It will also swell to a large size one day and then explode and turn into a white dwarf. Fortunately for us, this will only happen within a few billion years.