The life of the Sun may be coming to an end. This study says our Sun will die.
Those of us who have gone through a midlife crisis know that it is a period of great emotional upheaval. Everyone who reaches a certain age goes through it. Now, it has been revealed that not even massive celestial bodies like the Sun are safe from it. And yes, this also indicates that our Sun will also die.
A new study by the European Space Agency (ESA) has revealed that the Sun has entered its middle age, estimated at about 4.57 billion years. The Sun also appears to be going through a midlife crisis with frequent solar flares, coronal mass ejections (CMEs) and solar storms. The study was carried out with the help of data collected by the Gaia spacecraft.
The Sun is currently at the peak of its 11-year solar cycle, which has resulted in frequent solar flares, coronal mass ejections, and solar storms. At the end of the cycle, the frequency of these phenomena will decrease.
As the Sun ages, the hydrogen in the Sun’s core will run out and the Sun will become a red giant star, lowering its surface temperature and cooling. According to the ESA, as the Sun reaches the end of its life cycle, it will become a dim white dwarf star.
Orlagh Creevey of the Côte d’Azur Observatory in France looked for the data by studying some of the oldest stars in the Milky Way with surface temperatures between 3000K and 10000K. Orlagh said: “We wanted to have a really pure sample of stars with high precision measurements.”
The study concluded that the Sun will reach its maximum temperatures about 8 billion years in the future, after which it will reduce its surface temperature and increase in size.
Orlagh said: “If we don’t understand our own Sun and there is so much we don’t know about it, how can we hope to understand all the other stars that make up our wonderful galaxy.”
NASA, on the other hand, said earlier in its report: “As it begins to die, the Sun will expand into a red giant star, becoming so large that it will engulf Mercury and Venus, and possibly Earth as well. Scientists predict. the Sun is a little less than halfway through its life and will last 5 billion years or so before it turns into a white dwarf.”