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Thursday, August 17, 2023

HD 45166: The Most Magnetic Massive Star Found | Artist’s Animation | ESO

HD 45166: The Most Magnetic Massive Star Found | Artist’s Animation | ESO

This video shows an artist’s animation of HD 45166, a massive star recently discovered to have a powerful magnetic field of 43,000 gauss, the strongest magnetic field ever found in a massive star. Intense winds of particles blowing away from the star are trapped by this magnetic field, enshrouding the star in a gaseous shell as illustrated here.

This finding provides clues to the origin of magnetars, compact dead stars laced with magnetic fields at least a billion times stronger than the one in HD 45166. Astronomers believe that this star will end its life as a magnetar. As it collapses under its own gravity, its magnetic field will strengthen, and the star will eventually become a very compact core with a magnetic field of around 100 trillion gauss—the most powerful type of magnet in the Universe.

HD 45166 is part of a binary system. In the background, we get a glimpse of HD 45166’s companion, a normal blue star that has been found to orbit at a far larger distance than previously reported.


Credit: ESO/L. Calçada

Duration: 19 seconds

Release Date: Aug. 8, 2023


#NASA #ESO #Astronomy #Space #Science #Stars #NeutronStars #Magnetars #Star #HD45166 #Magnetic #HeliumStar #Supernova #Monoceros #Constellation #Astrophysics #Heliophysics #Universe #Telescopes #Chile #Europe #STEM #Education #Animation #HD #Video

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