Stellar evolution: Difference between revisions
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How do stars form, how do they burn for so long and how do they die? This lesson aims to explain the entire process of a star's evolution from formation to its sometimes violent death. | How do stars form, how do they burn for so long and how do they die? This lesson aims to explain the entire process of a star's evolution from formation to its sometimes violent death. | ||
Stellar evolution can be described as the birth, life, and death of a star. A period that can last from ten billion to a few hundred | Stellar evolution can be described as the birth, life, and death of a star. A period that can last from ten billion to a few hundred million years depending on its size. Our Sun is about 4.5 billion years old and should last us another six billion years, making our Sun an average star amongst the bounty and variety of stellar masses in our galaxy, the Milkyway. | ||
Throughout a star's life, the star fiercely consumes its hydrogen through the process of nuclear fusion in its core, creating new and heavier elements until the star has exhausted all of its fuel. The end of a star's life again depends on the star's size; for example, our sun will most likely become a red giant and then slowly shrink for another few million years and become a dark cinder called a brown dwarf. Yet other stars with much larger masses, of about ten times that of our Sun's, have an increased chance that they may burst and eject all of their stellar material into the surrounding space leaving behind a super-dense object called a neutron star. | Throughout a star's life, the star fiercely consumes its hydrogen through the process of nuclear fusion in its core, creating new and heavier elements until the star has exhausted all of its fuel. The end of a star's life again depends on the star's size; for example, our sun will most likely become a red giant and then slowly shrink for another few million years and become a dark cinder called a brown dwarf. Yet other stars with much larger masses, of about ten times that of our Sun's, have an increased chance that they may burst and eject all of their stellar material into the surrounding space leaving behind a super-dense object called a neutron star. | ||