Our sun is big. It’s 864,000 miles or 1,392,000 km in diameter. Or 109x wider than Earth. But it’s also an average sized star.
Some stars are much bigger.
Betelgeuse, in the constellation Orion, is a red supergiant star ~700x the size of the sun.
If we replaced our sun with Betelgeuse, it would stretch past Jupiter's orbit. https://universe.nasa.gov/news/237/what-is-betelgeuse-inside-the-strange-volatile-star/ #space #science
What is Betelgeuse? Inside the Strange, Volatile Star
A blazing red supergiant shining brilliantly in the night sky, Betelgeuse is a star that has captured attention for centuries.NASA Universe Exploration
Paul Murphy
in reply to Sheril Kirshenbaum • • •Son Light Life
in reply to Sheril Kirshenbaum • • •Mark Maguire
in reply to Sheril Kirshenbaum • • •GATEKEEPER
in reply to Sheril Kirshenbaum • • •Michael Porter
in reply to Sheril Kirshenbaum • • •I stopped calling our Sun an “average” star when I learned that something like 75% of stars are red dwarfs. It’s in the middle, size-wise, but it’s large compared to a large majority of stars.
It also bothered me that red dwarfs got the shaft in texts (early high school) that I taught out of - they barely rated a mention in descriptions of properties and life cycles of stars.
PadreWil
in reply to Sheril Kirshenbaum • • •Shadow, First of His Name :verified: :meowcoffeespitting:
in reply to Sheril Kirshenbaum • • •i posted something similar on the size of stars that's 10,000 times bigger in the early Universe.
https://social.everythingbagel.me/@Shadow/110455149873747176
serklarvel
in reply to Sheril Kirshenbaum • • •🥥 Tucker Carlson's Nuts 🥥
in reply to Sheril Kirshenbaum • • •Now please, nobody say Betelgeuse 3 times. Thank you. 🥥
Axperte
in reply to Sheril Kirshenbaum • • •Bodling
in reply to Sheril Kirshenbaum • • •Nlroundabout
in reply to Sheril Kirshenbaum • • •NItzzy
in reply to Sheril Kirshenbaum • • •Rai Aren 🖖✨📚🇺🇦
in reply to Sheril Kirshenbaum • • •Michael Porter
in reply to Sheril Kirshenbaum • • •Thanks for starting this, Sheril… stellar evolution is a favourite topic of mine 😄
Just remembered another cool factoid. While Betelgeuse is huge, it's only ~10x the mass of our Sun, give or take. That means the average density of Betelgeuse is about a *millionth* the density of air at Earth's sea level – It's been nicknamed a "red hot vacuum” 🤯
That said, the *core* is still very dense and hot, enough to carry on nuclear fusion for a little while longer!
tbgosalvez
in reply to Sheril Kirshenbaum • • •I learned in college that VY Canis Majoris would go out to Saturn's orbit
"Betelgeuse" is a cooler name though 🙂