logo
Astronomers Spot Companion Star in Orbit Around Iconic Star Betelgeuse, Confirming Suspicions

Astronomers Spot Companion Star in Orbit Around Iconic Star Betelgeuse, Confirming Suspicions

Gizmodo4 days ago
In 2024, astronomers surmised that Betelgeuse might have a stellar 'buddy.' If this hypothetical companion existed, it would help answer some questions about the red supergiant's strange glowing patterns. As it turns out, these suspicions were correct.
After numerous false signals and empty search results, astronomers with NASA's Ames Research Center have confirmed that Betelgeuse does, in fact, have a tiny buddy star. The young star, with a mass about 1.5 times that of the Sun, likely exerts some unsolicited influence on the larger star's gravitational field and the cosmic dust floating in its vicinity. The interactions between the two stars make it appear as though Betelgeuse—unlike most stars of its kind—undergoes an additional, extended period of intermittent dimming roughly every six years.
'Papers that predicted Betelgeuse's companion believed that no one would likely ever be able to image it,' Steve Howell, an astronomer who led the team that discovered the star, said in a statement. 'This now opens the door for other observational pursuits of a similar nature.'
For the discovery, astronomers used the Gemini North telescope in Hawaii, employing a technique known as speckle imaging, which uses very short exposure times to wipe out distortions in space images caused by Earth's atmosphere. This allowed the researchers to directly capture the companion star at a high enough resolution to identify some key characteristics about the newly discovered star, such as its mass and temperature.
What's fascinating about 'BetelBuddy'—as the researchers who predicted its existence called it in a past interview with Gizmodo—is that it was probably born around the same time as Betelgeuse. To put this into perspective, Betelgeuse, a red supergiant, is nearing the end of its stellar lifespan, and astronomers predict it could explode into a fiery supernova within a decade or so. But the newly discovered companion star is so young that it hasn't even started igniting hydrogen at its core, implying that it's still at the earliest stages of stellar evolution. This is likely because Betelgeuse, which is somewhere between 10 and 20 times the mass of our Sun, has a far shorter lifespan compared to its lightweight buddy.
Given Betelgeuse's relative proximity to Earth, astronomers have studied it more closely than most other stars for centuries. From their observations, astronomers found that the star's brightness varies on a cycle of about 400 days, with a secondary period lasting around six years. Variable stars are relatively common, but astronomers had long struggled to explain why Betelgeuse had an extended dimming period.
To be clear, this is different from the 'Great Dimming' of Betelgeuse from 2019 to 2020, which scientists suspect is the result of the star ejecting a large cloud of dust that subsequently blurred its brightness.
The Mystery of Betelgeuse's Weird Dimming Is Likely Solved
With the new discovery, astronomers now have a good answer to the mystery behind the years-long dimming and brightening pattern of the huge star Betelgeuse. They expect, however, that Betelgeuse's intense gravitational pull will gobble up the young star within the next 10,000 years.
Thankfully, this won't be the first and last time we see BetelBuddy alive. Astronomers expect the young star to pass within our telescopes' detection range in November 2027, when it flies the farthest away from Betelgeuse.
Orange background

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Comments

No comments yet...

Related Articles

UT Arlington's plastic-infused asphalt hits Texas roads for the first time
UT Arlington's plastic-infused asphalt hits Texas roads for the first time

CBS News

time36 minutes ago

  • CBS News

UT Arlington's plastic-infused asphalt hits Texas roads for the first time

Drivers traveling on a nearly mile-long section of SH 205 in Rockwall wouldn't notice anything unique about the asphalt, but what's underneath the surface could change the way roadways are built in the future. For the first time, the Texas Department of Transportation is testing an innovative, plastic-infused asphalt on one of its highways, thanks to a team of engineers at UT Arlington. The hope is to address two major problems at once: mounting plastic waste and failing infrastructure. "We have a road network that's deteriorating," said Dr. Sahadat Hossain, a professor of civil engineering at UTA and the director of the Solid Waste Institute for Sustainability. "So we are using plastic in building the road. We are taking one problem to solve another problem. And this is the perfect example of sustainability." TxDOT is evaluating how well the plastic-infused asphalt performs under real traffic and brutal summer temperatures, conditions students at UTA have been simulating in a lab for six years. "And for our samples itself, they're submerged in the water and they're also heated, which means that they're put to the worst possible condition that your pavement can be," said graduate student Garima Maharjan. "And then the wheels start running back and forth." Samples of normal asphalt pavement in the lab have major signs of wear-and-tear after the series of tests, while the mix infused with plastic particles have little damage. In 2023, Hossain's team used the plastic-infused pavement on two UTA parking lots, and ongoing performance evaluations show the asphalt is holding up well and is more durable than the typical asphalt. "If we add plastic in the asphalt, the road durability increases, the rotting in the road and potholes in the road goes down significantly and it becomes a longer-lasting road." Dr. Hossain said. "So we are not only helping the environment, we are not only fixing the road, we are helping reducing the cost of road maintenance for the state of Texas. And hopefully in future it will be for the entire country." The asphalt is infused with the plastic that sits in dumps and landfills or winds up in the ocean. Of the 48 million tons of plastic waste generated in the U.S. every year, the Department of Energy estimates only five to six percent gets recycled. The plastic-infused asphalt could pave the way for a new model, where our trash finds a better way to make an impact on the earth. TxDOT and the team at UTA are actively monitoring how this plastic-infused road in Rockwall performs. There are already plans to pave roads in Fort Worth and in Amarillo with the mix in the coming months, according to Dr. Hossain. He believes international projects will likely start in the next year as well, with inquiries from countries like Nigeria, Ethiopia and Saudi Arabia.

Meta names ChatGPT co-creator as chief scientist of Superintelligence Lab
Meta names ChatGPT co-creator as chief scientist of Superintelligence Lab

Yahoo

timean hour ago

  • Yahoo

Meta names ChatGPT co-creator as chief scientist of Superintelligence Lab

By Echo Wang NEW YORK (Reuters) -Meta Platforms has appointed Shengjia Zhao, co-creator of ChatGPT, as chief scientist of its Superintelligence Lab, CEO Mark Zuckerberg said on Friday, as the company accelerates its push into advanced AI. "In this role, Shengjia will set the research agenda and scientific direction for our new lab working directly with me and Alex," Zuckerberg wrote in a Threads post, referring to Meta's Chief AI Officer Alexandr Wang, who Zuckerberg hired from startup Scale AI when Meta took a big stake in it. Zhao, a former research scientist at OpenAI, co-created ChatGPT, GPT-4 and several of OpenAI's mini models, including 4.1 and o3. He is among several researchers who have moved from OpenAI to Meta in recent weeks, part of a broader talent arms race as Zuckerberg aggressively hires from rivals to close the gap in advanced AI. Meta has been offering some of Silicon Valley's most lucrative pay packages and striking startup deals to attract top researchers, a strategy that follows the underwhelming performance of its Llama 4 model. Meta launched the Superintelligence Lab recently to consolidate work on its Llama models and long‑term artificial general intelligence ambitions. Zhao is a co-founder of the lab, according to the Threads post, which operates separately from FAIR, Meta's established AI research division led by deep learning pioneer Yann LeCun. Zuckerberg has said Meta aims to build 'full general intelligence' and release its work as open source — a strategy that has drawn both praise and concern within the AI community.

NC-based app uses AI to fight denied health insurance claims
NC-based app uses AI to fight denied health insurance claims

Yahoo

time2 hours ago

  • Yahoo

NC-based app uses AI to fight denied health insurance claims

A new app developed in North Carolina is using artificial intelligence to fight denied health insurance claims. The app, from Counterforce, lets residents upload their insurance coverage documents along with their denial letter. ALSO READ: The cost of AI: Who pays to power the future? It then combines them to create a medically based analysis that residents can print and send back to their insurance company. Counterforce is free for anyone to use online. VIDEO: The cost of AI: Who pays to power the future?

DOWNLOAD THE APP

Get Started Now: Download the App

Ready to dive into a world of global content with local flavor? Download Daily8 app today from your preferred app store and start exploring.
app-storeplay-store