SciShow Space - 2023-01-27
R136a1 is the most massive star that astronomers have ever discovered. It's so massive you might think the laws of physics wouldn't allow it. But it turns out that its current mass estimate is actually so low that it threatens our understanding of how the universe got to be where it is, today! Hosted by: Reid Reimers (he/him) ---------- Huge thanks go to the following Patreon supporter for helping us keep SciShow Space free for everyone forever: Jason A Saslow, David Brooks, and AndyGneiss! Support SciShow Space by becoming a patron on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/SciShow Or by checking out our awesome space pins and other products over at DFTBA Records: http://dftba.com/scishow ---------- Looking for SciShow elsewhere on the internet? SciShow on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@scishow SciShow Tangents Podcast: http://www.scishowtangents.org Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/scishow Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/scishow Instagram: http://instagram.com/thescishow ---------- Sources: https://authors.library.caltech.edu/52364/1/1992AJ____104_1721C.pdf https://www.thecrimson.com/article/1981/2/25/a-star-is-born-r136a-makes/ https://noirlab.edu/public/news/noirlab2220/#:~:text=The%20new%20Zorro%20observations%2C%20however,the%20most%20massive%20known%20star. https://www.britannica.com/science/angular-resolution https://mavdisk.mnsu.edu/wp5884kt/courses/a125/telescopebasics.pdf https://www.britannica.com/science/Eddington-mass-limit https://academic.oup.com/mnras/article/408/2/731/1024495 https://ned.ipac.caltech.edu/level5/ESSAYS/Carr/carr.html#:~:text=The%20term%20%60%60Population%20III,dark%20matter%20in%20galactic%20halos https://www.space.com/strontium-heavy-element-formed-neutron-star-merger.html https://www.space.com/41313-most-massive-star.html Image Sources: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:The_young_cluster_R136.jpg https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Noirlab2220a_Sharpest_Image_Ever_of_R136a1,_Largest_Known_Star.jpg https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Star_Cluster_R136_-_Hubble.jpg https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/video/mauna-kea-observatories-stock-footage/852432368?phrase=telescope%20mauna https://hubblesite.org/contents/media/images/1990/09/6-Image.html https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Grand_star-forming_region_R136_in_NGC_2070_(captured_by_the_Hubble_Space_Telescope).jpg https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Comparison_of_the_sizes_of_a_red_dwarf,_the_Sun,_a_B-type_main_sequence_star,_and_R136a1.jpg https://www.eso.org/public/images/eso1030c/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:EtaCarinae.jpg https://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/sun-rings-in-new-month-with-strong-flare https://www.nasa.gov/vision/universe/starsgalaxies/fuse_fossil_galaxies.html https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/video/meteor-shower-shooting-across-the-milky-way-stock-footage/1331444841?phrase=stars https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:R136a1.jpg https://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2007/sn2006gy/more.html https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/the-soul-nebula-in-the-constellation-of-cassiopeia-royalty-free-image/1339147005?phrase=space https://www.eso.org/public/france/images/tarantula/?lang https://phys.org/news/2022-08-astronomers-images-r136-massive-star.html https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/video/flying-into-deep-space-to-the-tarantula-nebula-also-stock-footage/1329213424?phrase=tarantula%20nebula
I get so excited when I learn that scientists come across something they can’t explain. It means we have the opportunity to learn something new about our universe.
Information is totally dependent on grant money. Want to succeed as a scientist? Support the latest fad hypothesis and call it 'consensus'. Grant funds magically shower upon thee!
@@Le_Comte_de_Monte_Felin that's not how that works.
@@Le_Comte_de_Monte_Felin spoken like a non-scientist. Way to show your ignorance.
@@Le_Comte_de_Monte_Felin That happens occasionally, but those people aren't scientists and they don't win Nobel prizes or have their work taken seriously.
This speaker has become my favorite of the group. Lots of voice inflection and personality in his narration draws the listener in. Good work!
His tone also reminds me a bit of Neil de Grasse Tyson.
I do quite like his narration style
He's very well informed and not too prone to "dumbing it down" I like he isn't afraid to get the complexity across.
Finally, someone admits that size AND technique matter.
You, sir, made me chuckle.
and a hot young star love that
@@littleollad3219 Finally? You must be dating the wrong stars.
Yes, matter can also produce small but efficient stars.
Ur mum's known that for years.
"It's not just telescope size that matters. Technique does too."
Unfortunately, I lack both
Sounds like he is plunging his telescope into black holes rather then looking at stars.
0:52 "If you want to study the stars, you're going to want to use a telescope." For some reason, I assumed that that was going to lead into a sponsorship ad. "You should buy X brand of telescope because it's great for studying the stars!"
Its sad that ads made society into this
Takeaway message from the video "It's not just the size that matters, technique is important too"
Hey! Mandela effect in the thumbnail!
Seems a lot of us distinctly remember “objects in mirror may be closer than they appear”, but the phrase has always been
“objects in mirror are closer than they appear”.
Despite my distinct memories of having read it a thousand times and seen it in movies as “objects may appear…”
Reid is by far the best presenter on this channel! Laid back personality and his speaking is filled with clarity!
Currently, yes. I miss Hank tho, he had been great too
"No, baby... it only looks small because of the speckling."
This guy is my favorite SciShow nerd.
'It was twelve stars in a trench coat'
Man and I thought having eight Kobold in a trnech coat was impressive.
The universe is metal, man! 🤟🏻
Thanks for the information and dedication.
Did a SciShow channel just say that it's not the size of the telescope but how you use it? ;-)
This just goes to show that there is always more to learn.
Nope, they said size AND technique matter.
Sounds like someone is plunging their telescope into black holes instead of looking at stars.
Where you point it is very important too
There's a `Just' in there.
There's too much metal in the universe, how did this happen?
Eru and the Ainur: singing soft opera
Melkor: playing a Dimmu Borgir album ...what?
Someone estimate how big that trenchcoat would need to be. For science.
Pretty big
+
"Back my day, even the Stars were bigger!"
"Kids nowadays can't handle a few hundred solar masses!"
Huh that's pretty interesting. This is in my syllabus and it states that the largest stars found are around 300 Solar Masses and that supernovae from type III stars are the origin of most of our heavy metals. I wonder what else I've been learning all these years that could be wrong.
lol. How about this. The universe is a quantum wave function that is in the process of collapsing. How can a wave function collapse unless it is observed?
Time makes no difference to the quantum world. It could be the cause of the Big bang hasn't happened yet.
I mean it's not exactly wrong, just not proven.
Knowing what we don’t know is better than not knowing what we don’t know.
What we ignore is greater than what we know nevertheless.
I know R136a1 held the title of most massive star for a long time but is it still considered the most massive star we know of? According to Wikipedia, Westerhout 49-2 and BAT 99-98 are more massive. Of course, all these stars lose a lot of mass over time so it is possible that R136a1 may have started out the most massive but as of now, it is the third most massive according to Wikipedia.
Didn't we detect a possible pair instability supernova last year (or at least recently)?
I thought it was determined a while ago that neutron star collisions produced a great deal of the heavier elements in the universe. Can’t remember the exact amounts, but I am surprised this detail was not mentioned here. It seems like an important side point.
How? It is focused on this specific topic, which is fat nicer
SciShow Space says "R136a1 is the most massive star that astronomers have ever discovered."
What about BAT99-98 and Westerhout 49-2 ?
I think there is more uncertainty over the mass of the other two. Or simply an out-of-date claim.
Did I think the small size or the big size
I think it's about 30x sun
Curious Droid called ... He wants his shirt back...
"in a trenchcoat" made me lol
Whenever I hear that voice I smile.. glad you're still here buddy!
really nice video
Some stars have brightly glowing heliosphere plasma which creates an illusion of being impossibly massive. Our Sun's heliosphere on the other hand glows very faintly.
Stellar!
One of these days, SciShow Space will feel comfortable enough to say "supernovae" instead of "supernovas."
Whoever made the thumbnail should get a raise
It’s surprising how surprising the Universe is !
How can we tell if a distant star/galaxy isn't made of anti-matter?
Is it something to do with the polarisation of light emitted from it or something else?
You should do a video on all the proofs we have for the oort cloud???..???
This thing is like one of those cars that people just keep coming out of
5:15
"a single (Pair-instability) supernova could seed more metals into the universe than all other supernovas combined."
Wait. What?
There must have been billions or trillions of other supernovas in the history of the universe. considering that, the quote is a bold statement.
R136a1 sounds like a refrigerant.
Maybe they should start every assertion with "our current best guess"and end it with" information subject to change"
Is it possible that we simply haven't found any 300+ solar-mass stars yet? The stars in the Tarantula Nebula are packed pretty close together so they probably had to share a lot of the material from the gas cloud they formed from. Maybe in order for a truly gargantuan star to form it needs to form alone, consuming the entire molecular hydrogen cloud it forms from into itself.
What about the paper published today about the new James Webb telescope very massive very early stars images?
I thought R136a was a refrigerant
Had me at “modern stars” 😅
Where is the video on the three supernovae?
Would like to see a few 🔭 Webb images of this and a few other supposedly massive ⭐🌟✨'s.
Our entire triangulation of objects in space is wrong by a massive amount.
For a second, I thought this was Penn Jillette voicing this.
Cool shirt😎
Would an electro-weak star break the Eddington Limit? 🤔
It would have its own Eddington limit based on gravity and the radiation pressure generated by electroweak burning. It would also be at the very edge of being dense enough to collapse into a black hole, so I think that's the real limit.
It's not just size that matters it's technic
@tomasbeblar5639 - 2023-01-27
Scientists were wrong, and that's just as exciting as them being right.
@singletona082 - 2023-01-27
Sometimes even moreso.
@hansolowe19 - 2023-01-27
Something new to look at. 🤓
@saintjupi - 2023-01-27
one of the few jobs being wrong can be more exiting then being right
@TheReaverOfDarkness - 2023-01-27
Scientists being right isn't nearly as exciting.
@krista2216 - 2023-01-27
It's probably better to be wrong at first. That way you get your assumptions broken, and potentially get a much clearer understanding of why x y and z are true