The biggest star ever discovered in the Milky Way, called the W26, is in its death throes and will ultimately explode per scientists.
W26 is 16,000 light years away from the constellatin of ARA and is 1500 times wider than the sun. The star was first observed in 1998 and is a "red supergiant" which basically is a term for a star that is massive but has a short life span.
Astronomers at the European Southern Observatory in Chile reportedly spotted telltale signs in Wedenesday, October 16 and believe that the red supergiant star is nearing its end journey and will eventually explode as a supernova.
"Stars with masses tens of times larger than that of the sun live very short and dramatic lives compared to their less massive siblings," said officials with the Royal Astronomical Society (RAS) in the U.K. in a statement. "Some of the most massive stars have lifetimes of less than a few million years before they exhaust their nuclear fuel and explode as supernovas. At the very ends of their lives these stars become highly unstable and eject a considerable amount of material from their outer envelopes."
According to the paper published in the British journal Monthly Notices of Britain's RAS, W26 is becoming unstable and shedding its outer layers. The star is also surrounded by nebula of glowing hydrogen.
'The presence of the nebula, high stellar luminosity and spectral variability suggest that W26 is a highly evolved RSG (red supergiant) experiencing extreme levels of mass loss,' says the paper.
The "red supergiant" is located in a star cluster called Westerlund 1, which is home to several thousands of stars. Per researchers, observing Westerlund 1 can be problematic as light from the star is affected by gas and dust clouds.
When a red supergiant sheds its outer layer, stuff that spews out includes several elements such as magnesium and silicon, which are essential for the formation of rocky planets like Earth.
"How this material is ejected and how this affects the evolution of the star is however still a mystery," per the RAS.
