World's oldest star Methuselah is older than Universe — but how?
World's oldest star Methuselah is 16 billion years old, 190 light-years away from Earth
The oldest star in the universe is HD140283 — or Methuselah as it's commonly known.
— Caltech/File
Saturday, March 09, 2024
Web Desk
Sci-tech
Methuselah or HD140283 was found to be an astonishing 16 billion years old or "oldest star of the Universe", when scientists observed it with the European Space Agency's (ESA) Hipparcos satellite in 2002.
This number was really surprising, as the age of the Universe itself was estimated to be 13.8 billion years old, so a star being older than the Universe baffled experts, according to Space.
"It was a serious discrepancy," says astronomer Howard Bond of Pennsylvania State University.
Keeping this in mind, he and his colleagues planned to explore the truth and determine the precision of this number. As a result, their conclusions were found to be mind-blowing.
Methuselah is named after a biblical patriarch, who died at the age of 969, which makes him the oldest figure in the Bible.
The wonderous star resides some 190 light-years away from the Earth and in the constellation of Libra.
It fastly travels across the sky at 800,000 mph (1.3 kilometres per hour).
The tests explained that the star was really old. It is made up of hydrogen and helium and consists of very little iron.
This also signifies that this star must have been born when the Universe was ruled helium and hydrogen before iron, as the heavier elements started appearing when gigantic stars created them in their cores.
Web Desk
Sci-tech
Methuselah or HD140283 was found to be an astonishing 16 billion years old or "oldest star of the Universe", when scientists observed it with the European Space Agency's (ESA) Hipparcos satellite in 2002.
This number was really surprising, as the age of the Universe itself was estimated to be 13.8 billion years old, so a star being older than the Universe baffled experts, according to Space.
"It was a serious discrepancy," says astronomer Howard Bond of Pennsylvania State University.
Keeping this in mind, he and his colleagues planned to explore the truth and determine the precision of this number. As a result, their conclusions were found to be mind-blowing.
Methuselah is named after a biblical patriarch, who died at the age of 969, which makes him the oldest figure in the Bible.
The wonderous star resides some 190 light-years away from the Earth and in the constellation of Libra.
It fastly travels across the sky at 800,000 mph (1.3 kilometres per hour).
The tests explained that the star was really old. It is made up of hydrogen and helium and consists of very little iron.
This also signifies that this star must have been born when the Universe was ruled helium and hydrogen before iron, as the heavier elements started appearing when gigantic stars created them in their cores.
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