R136a1 facts for kids
R136a1 is an amazing star! It is the most massive and brightest star we know of. It is a special type of star called a Wolf–Rayet star.
This giant star is found right at the center of a group of stars called R136. This group is part of a much larger cluster of stars known as NGC 2070. All these stars are located inside the famous Tarantula nebula.
The Tarantula Nebula is about 163,000 light-years away from us. It is located in a nearby galaxy called the Large Magellanic Cloud.
R136a1 is truly enormous. It has 265 times the mass of our Sun. It also shines with 8.7 million times the luminosity (brightness) of the Sun! This star is also incredibly hot, with a temperature over 50,000 K.
The star cluster where R136a1 lives is quite young, only about 1.5 million years old. Together, the stars in this cluster give off a huge amount of energy. They shine 30 million times brighter than our Sun! R136a1 is the biggest of nine giant stars in this cluster.
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Where R136a1 Lives
R136a1 is part of a special group of stars called R136. This group is located in the heart of the Tarantula nebula. The Tarantula Nebula is a giant cloud of gas and dust where new stars are born. It is found in the Large Magellanic Cloud, which is a small galaxy that orbits our own Milky Way galaxy.
A Giant Star Factory
The Tarantula Nebula is like a huge factory for making stars. It is one of the most active star-forming regions in our local group of galaxies. This means lots of new stars are being born there all the time. R136a1 and its neighboring stars are some of the brightest and most massive stars ever formed in this region.
The Incredible Size of R136a1
R136a1 is known for being the most massive star discovered so far. When we say "massive," we mean it contains a huge amount of material. Imagine our Sun, which is already enormous. R136a1 has 265 times more material than our Sun!
It is also incredibly bright. Its light is 8.7 million times stronger than the Sun's light. This makes it one of the most luminous objects in the universe.
How Hot is R136a1?
Stars get their energy from nuclear reactions in their core, which makes them very hot. R136a1 is one of the hottest stars known. Its surface temperature is over 50,000 K (Kelvin). To give you an idea, the surface of our Sun is about 5,778 Kelvin. So, R136a1 is nearly ten times hotter than the Sun!
The Life of a Super-Massive Star
Stars like R136a1 are so big and hot that they burn through their fuel very quickly. Even though they are huge, they don't live as long as smaller stars like our Sun. Our Sun is expected to live for about 10 billion years. Stars like R136a1 might only live for a few million years.
When these super-massive stars run out of fuel, they often end their lives in a spectacular way. They can explode in a supernova, which is one of the most powerful explosions in the universe.
Images for kids
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Zooming in from the Tarantula Nebula to the R136 cluster, with R136a1/2/3 visible as the barely resolved knot at bottom right
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Sky position of R136a1 viewed from Argentina
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Left to right: a red dwarf, the Sun, a B-type main sequence star, and R136a1
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A size comparison between R136a1 and the Sun
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The R136 cluster in a massive star forming region in the LMC
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See also
In Spanish: R136a1 para niños
