When the low-mass stars called red supergiants die they disappear on a wimpy wind, or if scientists thought. New research just published, suggests that the opposite may be true. These stars, in fact, may die with a bang and not a whimper. The study, published today in the journal Science, researchers may lead to new understanding of the red supergiants, which are designed to solve the problems of nucleosynthesis, stellar structure and evolution of stars.
This discovery was really a huge surprise, said Dr. Michael Duncan, a research professor of chemistry at the University of Georgia. One of the beauties of doing basic science is that you never know where it might lead. Other authors of the article published in Science, is Gerard Meijer, Gert von Helden, Deniz van Heijnsbergen and the FOM Institute for Plasma Physics in Nieuwegein, AGGM Tiel, University of Groningen and S. Hony and LBFM Waters, University of Amsterdam, all Holland.
During their agony, low mass stars in new red supergiants, which are more properly called asymptotic giant branch stars or AGBs. Indeed, it takes up a certain type of stars, the AGB phase is a relatively short stage in which the low-mass stars are the brightest of them, but seeing a large mass loss that leads quickly to the global stage fog and a final cooling white dwarf.
This discovery was really a huge surprise, said Dr. Michael Duncan, a research professor of chemistry at the University of Georgia. One of the beauties of doing basic science is that you never know where it might lead. Other authors of the article published in Science, is Gerard Meijer, Gert von Helden, Deniz van Heijnsbergen and the FOM Institute for Plasma Physics in Nieuwegein, AGGM Tiel, University of Groningen and S. Hony and LBFM Waters, University of Amsterdam, all Holland.
During their agony, low mass stars in new red supergiants, which are more properly called asymptotic giant branch stars or AGBs. Indeed, it takes up a certain type of stars, the AGB phase is a relatively short stage in which the low-mass stars are the brightest of them, but seeing a large mass loss that leads quickly to the global stage fog and a final cooling white dwarf.
