Deneb - a photo on Flickriver

Deneb

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The supermassive blue-white star Deneb lies at a distance of 2,620 light years to Earth. Deneb is the brightest star in the constellation Cygnus (the swan). Deneb's size is estimated to be slightly greater than 200 solar diameters! It is utterly gigantic compared to our star, the sun.

The way in which stars create energy is they convert hydrogen (the most abundent element in the universe) into helium. This is essentially nuclear fusion, and creates a pressure which holds the star up against the opposite force of gravity, trying to crush it back down. This star has exhausted the hydrogen in it's core and expanded to become a supergiant. It will die in a huge explosion which we will easily detect here on Earth. Sitting around this region is vast plumes of hydrogen gas (shown in red). The variation in star colour here is quite beautiful. But what I find more curious than all of this, is there are two exoplanets (planets outwith our solar system) orbiting this star, way out there in space. Just imagine what those worlds could look like. If they are anywhere near to this star they could be strange, violent places influenced by immense gravity and turmoil. If they exist far enough from the star itself, they could even harbour life.

NB - NASA have detected planets around distant stars using the Kepler space telescope. Now obviously, exoplanets do not emit light so there is no possible way to take pictures of them at this vast distance. What Kepler infact does, is monitors the amount of light emited from the star, and detects the tiny,
infinitesimal change in brightness, as the tiny exoplanet crosses between us and the star. Imagine how sensiitive it has to be to discover this.

Taken on: January 24, 2024

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