Monday, June 17, 2013

Red supergiant stars – Explained

Ever wondered what are Red supergiants? What gives red supergiant red color? Read it here know some facts about the massive red giant stars.

Stars become red super-giant during their helium burning phase that takes place after the hydrogen burning phase of stars of about ten solar masses or more.  They have comparatively very cool temperatures of about 3500 to 4500 K.

The red super giant stars are the largest stars in terms of physical size, and are of K-M spectral type. While these are known are the largest stars with respect to their physical size, these are not the most massive stars in the universe. They have enormous radii and a luminosity class of I.

An original picture of red super giant star from Hubble space telescope (topicswhatsoever.blogpsot.com)

An original picture of red super giant star taken from Hubble space telescope (topicswhatsoever.blogpsot.com)



Most of the red super giants have radius of 200 to 800 times the radius of our Sun.

Presently, the four largest known red super giant stars in Milky Way galaxy are:
  • Mu Cephei
  • KW Sagitarii
  • V354 Cephei
  • KY Cygni

All of these four giant stars have a radius nearly 1500 times that of the Sun and are at distance of approximately 7 times the distance between the Earth and the Sun.

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