Godzilla: the brightest star ever seen?
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Godzilla is a hot, blue object in the Sunburst galaxy, whose light left it nearly 11 billion years ago. Scientists think it may be a luminous blue variable star, a bit like Eta Carinae, shining roughly 134 to 255 million times as bright as the Sun. We can only see it because a giant galaxy cluster bends and magnifies its light like a lens, by hundreds to maybe thousands of times. Astronomers are still arguing about whether it is one huge star or a small cluster of stars.
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Transcript
- Sef Tiggy, why do astronomers call one star Godzilla?
- Sef Easy! It stomps around space breathing fire!
- Tiggy Nope. A hot blue star, far away. Maybe the brightest ever seen.
- Sef So how do we even see it?
- Tiggy A galaxy cluster bends its light like a giant magnifying glass.
- Tiggy It may shine up to 255 million Suns bright.
- Sef Whoa. Even monster stars need glasses!
Sources
- Wikipedia: Godzilla (star) en.wikipedia.org
- arXiv: The Sunburst Arc with JWST II, an Eta Carinae Analog arxiv.org
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