Why do some stars become red supergiants?

Why do some stars become red supergiants?

A red supergiant occurs when a moderately massive star — perhaps 8–40 solar masses in size — exhausts its hydrogen fuel, evolves off of the main sequence, and transitions to fusing helium within its core. As this occurs, the star’s radius expands, causing its temperature to plummet.

Do all stars become red giants?

To become a red giant, a particular star must have between half our sun’s mass, and eight times our times our sun’s mass. Astronomers call such stars low- or intermediate-mass stars. So you can see that our sun is one of the stars that will inevitably, someday, become a red giant.

Why does the star expand as it turns into a red giant in Stage 9?

“Meanwhile, the helium core continues to contract and increase in temperature, which leads to an increased energy generation rate in the hydrogen shell,” the explainer continues. “This causes the star to expand enormously and increase in luminosity — the star becomes a red giant.”

What is the difference between a red giant and a supergiant?

While a red giant might form when a star with the mass of our Sun runs out of fuel, a red supergiant occurs when a star with more than 10 solar masses begins this phase. The five largest known supergiants in the galaxy are red supergiants: VY Canis Majoris, Mu Cephei, KW Sagitarii, V354 Cephei, and KY Cygni.

Why won’t our Sun become a supergiant star?

Our sun isn’t massive enough to trigger a stellar explosion, called a supernova, when it dies, and it will never become a black hole either. In order to create a supernova, a star needs about 10 times the mass of our sun.

Do all red giants end in supernova?

All red supergiants will exhaust the helium in their cores within one or two million years and then start to burn carbon. This continues with fusion of heavier elements until an iron core builds up, which then inevitably collapses to produce a supernova.

Can a star become a red giant more than once?

Yes, a star can become a red giant more than once. However, these are two different phases of being a red giant. The first phase occurs when the star depletes its hydrogen supply. This causes the star to expand and cool.

What happens if the Sun turns into a red giant?

When the Sun exhausts it hydrogen fuel and enters its Red Giant phase it will expand to roughly 100 times its present size. This will make the distance from the Sun to Jupiter shrink from 765 million to roughly 500 million kilometers.

What is the condition for a star to become a red giant?

A red giant is a star that has exhausted the supply of hydrogen in its core and has begun thermonuclear fusion of hydrogen in a shell surrounding the core.

What determines whether a star will be a red giant or supergiant?

The fusion of hydrogen to form helium changes the interior composition of a star, which in turn results in changes in its temperature, luminosity, and radius. Eventually, as stars age, they evolve away from the main sequence to become red giants or supergiants.

Why Big star become bigger at its life end?

Eventually the core of the star runs out of hydrogen. When that happens, the star can no longer hold up against gravity. Its inner layers start to collapse, which squishes the core, increasing the pressure and temperature in the core of the star.

Why do supergiants explode?

As supergiants burn ever more massive elements, their cores become hotter and more pressurized. Ultimately, by the time they start fusing iron and nickel, these stars run out of energy, their cores collapse and they eject their gassy outer atmospheres into space in a violent type II supernova explosion.

Is there anything bigger than a supergiant?

Hypergiants — larger than supergiants and giants — are rare stars that shine very brightly. They lose much of their mass through fast-moving stellar winds.

Are supergiants hotter than giants?

Because supergiants are so massive, the core temperature gets much hotter than in giants, so supergiants can fuse elements heavier than hydrogen and helium.

Do high mass stars become red supergiants?

A high-mass star (many times more massive than the Sun) goes through a similar, but a slightly different process. It changes more drastically than its sun-like siblings and becomes a red supergiant.

Why do some stars become super red giant quizlet?

Red Supergiants are created when the core runs out of hydrogen fuel supply and the star begins to collapse in on itself. The outer shells of hydrogen then begin to get hot enough to begin fusion.

Why do some stars flash red?

This is because of scintillation (“Twinkling”) as the light passes through the atmosphere of the Earth. As the air moves in and out, the starlight is refracted, often different colors in different directions. Because of this “chromatic abberation,” stars can appear to change colors when they are twinkling strongly.

Why do some stars burn red?

The color of a star is linked to its surface temperature. The hotter the star, the shorter the wavelength of light it will emit. The hottest ones are blue or blue-white, which are shorter wavelengths of light. Cooler ones are red or red-brown, which are longer wavelengths.