Have you hugged a red dwarf lately?

If not you still have plenty of time....

When i read up on stars one thing i find interesting is the rate at
which different stars consume their fuel.

You all probably know this but... big stars use fuel faster than
little ones and using our sun as a base you can quickly estimate the
longevity of other stars if you know their mass as a proportion of the
sun's mass. The calculations are findable via google.

Really big stars don't last long at all, no wonder we don't see many!
Small stars last a long time, no wonder they dominate the galaxy (i'm
sure formation influences the ratio too).

The lead news item on this site
http://planetquest.jpl.nasa.gov/
Tells of a brown dwarf circling a dwarf star with something like 9% of
the sun's mass.

I make that a lifetime of roughly over 4,000,000,000,000 years!
getting on for 400 times longer than our sun!

Some sci-fi stories tell of future civilisations in a dying universe
'hugging' dwarf stars for surival, with all the big stars long since
gone.

It's a fascinating universe out there, so now to something closer to
home - what's the best dwarf class star to view in the northern
hemisphere if you have a modest scope?

gswork nous a écrit :


It's a fascinating universe out there, so now to something closer to
home - what's the best dwarf class star to view in the northern
hemisphere if you have a modest scope?

Barnard's star in Ophiucus. Class M star.
As it's very close from the Earth, you can see its proper motion in a few
years.
Or 61 Cygni, which is a double K star.

--
Norbert. (no X for the answer)
======================================
knowing the universe - stellar and galaxies evolution
http://nrumiano.free.fr
images of the sky http://images.ciel.free.fr
======================================

gswork nous a écrit :


It's a fascinating universe out there, so now to something closer to
home - what's the best dwarf class star to view in the northern
hemisphere if you have a modest scope?

Barnard's star in Ophiucus. Class M star.
As it's very close from the Earth, you can see its proper motion in a few
years.
Or 61 Cygni, which is a double K star.

--
Norbert. (no X for the answer)
======================================
knowing the universe - stellar and galaxies evolution
http://nrumiano.free.fr
images of the sky http://images.ciel.free.fr
======================================

gswork wrote:

You all probably know this but... big stars use fuel faster than
little ones and using our sun as a base you can quickly estimate the
longevity of other stars if you know their mass as a proportion of the
sun's mass. The calculations are findable via google.

I make that a lifetime of roughly over 4,000,000,000,000 years!
getting on for 400 times longer than our sun!

At a professional conference once, I saw an interesting poster paper
(stellar astronomy is my broad area of research interest) about how M
dwarf stars end their lives. My first thought: Gee, what a great paper
to write, since NO ONE can prove you wrong since none have died yet!

Doug

gswork wrote:

You all probably know this but... big stars use fuel faster than
little ones and using our sun as a base you can quickly estimate the
longevity of other stars if you know their mass as a proportion of the
sun's mass. The calculations are findable via google.

I make that a lifetime of roughly over 4,000,000,000,000 years!
getting on for 400 times longer than our sun!

At a professional conference once, I saw an interesting poster paper
(stellar astronomy is my broad area of research interest) about how M
dwarf stars end their lives. My first thought: Gee, what a great paper
to write, since NO ONE can prove you wrong since none have died yet!

Doug

gswork posted:

It's a fascinating universe out there, so now to something closer to
home - what's the best dwarf class star to view in the northern
hemisphere if you have a modest scope?

How about the nice double Eta Cassiopeiae? It has a primary very similar to
our sun (spectral class G0V, magnitde 3.4) and a red-dwarf companion
(magnitude 7.5, spectral class dM0) only about 12 arc seconds away. The color
contrast is quite striking in a ten inch with the primary looking off-white
and the companion a very dim reddish-orange. Clear skies to you.
--
David W. Knisely
Prairie Astronomy Club: http://www.prairieastronomyclub.org
Hyde Memorial Observatory: http://www.hydeobservatory.info/

**********************************************
* Attend the 11th Annual NEBRASKA STAR PARTY *
* July 18-23, 2004, Merritt Reservoir *
* http://www.NebraskaStarParty.org *
**********************************************

gswork posted:

It's a fascinating universe out there, so now to something closer to
home - what's the best dwarf class star to view in the northern
hemisphere if you have a modest scope?

How about the nice double Eta Cassiopeiae? It has a primary very similar to
our sun (spectral class G0V, magnitde 3.4) and a red-dwarf companion
(magnitude 7.5, spectral class dM0) only about 12 arc seconds away. The color
contrast is quite striking in a ten inch with the primary looking off-white
and the companion a very dim reddish-orange. Clear skies to you.
--
David W. Knisely
Prairie Astronomy Club: http://www.prairieastronomyclub.org
Hyde Memorial Observatory: http://www.hydeobservatory.info/

**********************************************
* Attend the 11th Annual NEBRASKA STAR PARTY *
* July 18-23, 2004, Merritt Reservoir *
* http://www.NebraskaStarParty.org *
**********************************************

"Norbert" wrote in message ...
gswork nous a écrit :


It's a fascinating universe out there, so now to something closer to
home - what's the best dwarf class star to view in the northern
hemisphere if you have a modest scope?

Barnard's star in Ophiucus. Class M star.
As it's very close from the Earth, you can see its proper motion in a few
years.
Or 61 Cygni, which is a double K star.

I should have thought of Barnard's star! That's the one coming vaigly
in our direction isn't it?

"Norbert" wrote in message ...
gswork nous a écrit :


It's a fascinating universe out there, so now to something closer to
home - what's the best dwarf class star to view in the northern
hemisphere if you have a modest scope?

Barnard's star in Ophiucus. Class M star.
As it's very close from the Earth, you can see its proper motion in a few
years.
Or 61 Cygni, which is a double K star.

I should have thought of Barnard's star! That's the one coming vaigly
in our direction isn't it?

Doug O'Neal wrote in message ...
gswork wrote:

You all probably know this but... big stars use fuel faster than
little ones and using our sun as a base you can quickly estimate the
longevity of other stars if you know their mass as a proportion of the
sun's mass. The calculations are findable via google.

I make that a lifetime of roughly over 4,000,000,000,000 years!
getting on for 400 times longer than our sun!

At a professional conference once, I saw an interesting poster paper
(stellar astronomy is my broad area of research interest) about how M
dwarf stars end their lives. My first thought: Gee, what a great paper
to write, since NO ONE can prove you wrong since none have died yet!

Great idea! Even geologists can get caught out when something
unexpected happens, but solar astronomers - especially those
researching dwarf stars - will never see their projections
countered.... actually that's a little sad!