Far away in the constellation Monoceros, 3000 light years away, there is a star called HD 45166 which is preparing to become the strongest magnetic field in the Universe.
Illustration of a star that will become a magnetar, a neutron star with the strongest magnetic field in the universe. Credit: NOIRLab/AURA/NSF/P. Marenfeld/M. Zamani
Magnetar. This is the object that holds the universal record for being the strongest magnet in the Universe. Astronomers used to think that for a star to be a magnetar, it had to be very massive. Turns out, that’s not the case.
Bintang HD 45166
For more than a hundred years, scientists have studied the star HD 45166. We don’t know much about this star except for the fact that HD 45166 is rich in helium, more massive than the Sun, and part of double star. To better understand the strangeness of the star HD 45166, astronomers made observations with several telescopes including the Canada-France-Hawai’i Telescope (CFHT) on Mauna Kea.
The features of the star HD 45166 are similar to those of the Wolf-Rayet star. But there’s a difference. The star HD 45166 has a very different spectrum. Because of this, astronomers became curious and began to find out why this star was so strange.
Eureka!
It turns out that the star HD 45166 is a magnet. The latest observational data shows that the star HD 45166 has a very strong magnetic field, around 43,000 gauss. This is the strongest magnetic field ever found in a massive star.
Fate Be Magnetar
Scientists suspect that this star is on its way to becoming a magnetar. In a million years from now, HD 45166 will explode as supernova. The center of the star will contract and trap all the strong magnetic field lines. As a result, a neutron star is formed with a strong magnetic field, aka a magnetar. It is estimated that the magnetar that forms will have a magnetic field of 100 trillion gauss!
Using a telescope, the team of astronomers also succeeded in measuring the age and mass of HD 45166. According to astronomers, this star was formed from the merger of a pair of medium mass stars. This means that the magnetar, which is the strongest magnetic field in the universe, can form from a star that is not too massive under the right conditions.
Cool Facts
The star Wolf-Rayet WR 124, which is 15,000 light years from Earth in the constellation Sagitta, is one of the stars observed by the James Webb Space Telescope in its first observations.
Source: This article is a re-publication developed from Space Scoop Universe Awareness Indonesian edition. The Indonesian edition of Space Scoop was translated by Langitselatan.
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2023-10-04 09:03:37
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