{"id":374804,"date":"2025-08-26T11:29:13","date_gmt":"2025-08-26T11:29:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/374804\/"},"modified":"2025-08-26T11:29:13","modified_gmt":"2025-08-26T11:29:13","slug":"scientists-think-this-star-could-be-the-next-supernova","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/374804\/","title":{"rendered":"Scientists Think This Star Could Be the Next Supernova"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\"Red<\/a>Red supergiant DFK 52 and its surroundings as seen by ALMA. The vast, complex bubble blown by this extreme star is about 1.4 light-years across, thousands of times wider than our Solar System. ALMA measures light invisible to the human eye, with a wavelength of around 1.3 millimeters, emitted by molecules of carbon monoxide and silicon monoxide. Thanks to the Doppler effect, the team has measured how fast the gas is moving along our sightline towards the star. In this image, parts of the bubble moving away from us relative to the star are shown in red, and material moving towards us in blue. Credit: ALMA (ESO\/NAOJ\/NRAO)\/M. Siebert et al.<\/p>\n

A red supergiant star has blown an enormous bubble of gas and dust, baffling astronomers.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The structure, as massive as the Sun and larger than our solar system, formed in a sudden eruption thousands of years ago. Why the star didn\u2019t explode as a supernova remains a mystery.<\/p>\n

Discovery of a Vast Stellar Bubble<\/p>\n

Astronomers at Chalmers University of Technology in Sweden have identified a gigantic, expanding bubble of gas and dust surrounding a red supergiant star. It is the largest structure of this kind ever observed in the Milky Way. Containing as much mass as the Sun, the bubble was expelled in a violent stellar eruption about 4000 years ago. Scientists are still puzzled as to how the star managed to survive such a dramatic event.<\/p>\n

The findings, published in the journal Astronomy and Astrophysics, come from a team led by Mark Siebert of Chalmers. Using the ALMA radio telescope<\/a> in Chile, the researchers studied the red supergiant known as DFK 52, a star similar in many ways to the famous Betelgeuse<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"Red<\/a>Red supergiant star DFK 52 is a member of the star cluster Stephenson 2. In this image, the brightest stars are all supergiants and all members of the cluster. This image is made from data taken with the Spitzer Space Telescope in light much redder than our eyes can see (wavelengths 3.6, 4.5, 5.8, and 8 micrometers). Despite its remarkable bubble, too small to see in this image, DFK 52 is not unusually bright. The bright star in the lower left is another red supergiant, known as DFK 1 or Stephenson 2-18. It may be one of the largest stars known. Credit: NASA\/JPL-Caltech\/IPAC
\nA Giant, Expanding Cloud of Gas and Dust<\/p>\n

\u201cWe got a big surprise when we saw what ALMA was showing us. The star is more or less a twin of Betelgeuse, but it\u2019s surrounded by a vast, messy bubble of material,\u201d says Mark Siebert at Chalmers.<\/p>\n

This immense cloud, made of gas and dust, holds as much mass as the Sun and stretches 1.4 light years from the star. To put that in perspective, the bubble is thousands of times wider than our entire solar system.<\/p>\n

If DFK 52 were as close to Earth as Betelgeuse, the bubble would appear to cover about one third of the full Moon\u2019s width in the night sky.<\/p>\n

\"Mark<\/a>Mark Siebert, astronomer, Department of Space, Earth and Environment, Chalmers University of Technology, Sweden. Credit: Chalmers University of Technology | Christian L\u00f6whagen<\/p>\n

By tracking the movement of molecules in the gas with ALMA\u2019s radio observations, astronomers determined that the bubble is still expanding. They believe it originated when the star violently ejected part of its outer layers during an explosive outburst a few thousand years ago.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe bubble is made of material that used to be part of the star. It must have been ejected in a dramatic event, an explosion, that happened about four thousand years ago. In cosmic terms, that\u2019s just a moment ago,\u201d says Elvire De Beck, astronomer at Chalmers.<\/p>\n

The Galaxy\u2019s Next Supernova?<\/p>\n

Why DFK 52 shed so much mass without exploding as a supernova<\/a> is still unclear. One possibility is that the star has a hidden companion that helped it cast off its outer layers.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo us, it\u2019s a mystery as to how the star managed to expel so much material in such a short timeframe. Maybe, like Betelgeuse seems to, it has a companion star that\u2019s still to be discovered,\u201d says Mark Siebert.<\/p>\n

\"Elvire<\/a>Elvire De Beck, astronomer, Department of Space, Earth and Environment, Chalmers University of Technology, Sweden. Credit: Chalmers University of Technology | Christian L\u00f6whagen<\/p>\n

Red supergiants like DFK 52 are nearing the ends of their lives and are expected to eventually explode as supernovae. Could this star be next?<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re planning more observations to understand what\u2019s happening \u2013 and to find out whether this might be the Milky Way\u2019s next supernova. If this is a typical red supergiant, it could explode sometime in the next million years,\u201d says Elvire De Beck.<\/p>\n

Reference: \u201cStephenson 2 DFK 52: Discovery of an exotic red supergiant in the massive stellar cluster RSGC2\u201d by M. A. Siebert, E. De Beck, G. Quintana-Lacaci and W. H. T. Vlemmings, 6 August 2025, Astronomy & Astrophysics.
DOI: 10.1051\/0004-6361\/202555975<\/a><\/p>\n

The study was carried out by Mark Siebert, Elvire De Beck, and Wouter Vlemmings from Chalmers University of Technology in Sweden, together with Guillermo Quintana Lacaci from the Instituto de Fisica Fundamental in Spain.<\/p>\n

Red supergiants are among the brightest and rarest stars visible in the universe. They represent the final stage in the lives of stars that began with far greater mass than our Sun (more than eight times its mass). For astronomers, these stars are crucial for piecing together the life cycles of stars and planets. The most massive ones produce and release newly created elements into interstellar space, stirring up gas and dust and fueling the formation of future generations of stars.<\/p>\n

Within our own galaxy, the Milky Way, some red supergiants are visible without a telescope to anyone under a dark sky. Two of the best-known examples are Betelgeuse in the constellation Orion and Antares in Scorpius.<\/p>\n

\"ALMA<\/a>ALMA antennas pointing to the Milky Way in the Atacama Desert. Credit: NSF\/ AUI\/ NSF NRAO\/ B.Foott<\/p>\n

The Atacama Large Millimeter\/submillimeter Array (ALMA) is a world-class observatory located in Chile. It is operated as a collaboration between ESO, the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF), and Japan\u2019s National Institutes of Natural Sciences (NINS), working together with the Republic of Chile.<\/p>\n

In Sweden, Onsala Space Observatory at Chalmers University of Technology has played a role in ALMA from the very beginning. Among its contributions are specialized receivers built for the telescope. Onsala also hosts the Nordic ALMA Regional Centre, which offers technical expertise for the project and helps astronomers across the Nordic countries make full use of ALMA\u2019s capabilities.<\/p>\n

Never miss a breakthrough: Join the SciTechDaily newsletter.<\/a><\/b><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Red supergiant DFK 52 and its surroundings as seen by ALMA. The vast, complex bubble blown by this…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":374805,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3844],"tags":[56289,901,5632,68630,70,413,5636,52277,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-374804","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-space","8":"tag-alma","9":"tag-astronomy","10":"tag-astrophysics","11":"tag-chalmers-university-of-technology","12":"tag-science","13":"tag-space","14":"tag-stars","15":"tag-supernova","16":"tag-uk","17":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115094838805397767","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/374804","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=374804"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/374804\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/374805"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=374804"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=374804"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=374804"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}