The sky around W Hydrae, as seen in visible light. Credit: Digitized Sky Survey
A Chalmers-led team of astronomers has for the first time observed details on the surface of an aging star with the same mass as the Sun. The star is a giant, its diameter twice the size of Earth’s orbit around the Sun, but also that the star’s atmosphere is affected by powerful, unexpected shock waves. The research is published in Nature Astronomy on 30 October 2017. The new ALMA images show for the first time details on the surface of the red giant W Hydrae, 320 light years distant in the constellation of Hydra, the Water Snake.
W Hydrae is an example of an AGB (asymptotic giant branch) star. Such stars are cool, bright, old and lose mass via stellar winds...
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