The most distant stars visible from Earth. The most distant star: discovery, characteristics, distance How far from us are the stars

More than six thousand light years from the Earth's surface is a rapidly rotating neutron star - the Black Widow pulsar. She has a companion, a brown dwarf, which she constantly processes with her powerful radiation. They circle each other every 9 hours. Observing them through a telescope from our planet, you might think that this deadly dance does not concern you in any way, that you are just an outside witness of this "crime". However, it is not. Both participants in this action attract you to themselves.

And you, too, are pulling them - trillions of kilometers away, using gravity. Gravity is the force of attraction between any two objects that have mass. This means that any object in our Universe attracts any other object in it, and at the same time is attracted to it. Stars, black holes, people, smartphones, atoms - all this is in constant interaction. So why don't we feel this attraction from billions of different directions?

There are only two reasons - mass and distance. The equation that can be used to calculate the force of attraction between two objects was first formulated by Isaac Newton in 1687. The understanding of gravity has evolved somewhat since then, but in most cases, Newton's classical theory of gravity is applicable to calculating its strength today.

This formula looks like this - to find out the force of attraction between two objects, you need to multiply the mass of one by the mass of the other, multiply the resulting result by the gravitational constant, and divide all this by the square of the distance between the objects. Everything, as we can see, is quite simple. We can even experiment a little. If you double the mass of one object, the force of attraction doubles. If you "move" objects from each other the same two times, the force of attraction will be one-fourth of what it was before.

The force of gravity between you and the Earth pulls you towards the center of the planet, and you feel this force as your weight. This value is 800 Newtons if you are standing at sea level. But if you go to the Dead Sea, it will increase by a small fraction of a percent. If you accomplish the feat and climb to the top of Everest, the value will decrease - again, extremely insignificantly.

The Earth's gravitational force acts on the ISS, located at an altitude of about 400 kilometers, with almost the same force as on the planet's surface. If this station were erected on a huge stationary column, the base of which would stand on the Earth, then the force of gravity on it would be about 90% of what we feel. Astronauts are in zero gravity for the simple reason that the ISS is constantly falling on our planet. Fortunately, the station is moving at a speed that allows it to avoid collision with the Earth.

We fly further - to the moon. This is already 400,000 kilometers from home. The Earth's gravity here is only 0.03% of the original. But the gravity of our satellite is fully felt, which is six times less than we are used to. If you decide to fly even further, the Earth's gravity will fall, but you will never be able to get rid of it completely.

When you are on the surface of our planet, you feel the attraction of a great variety of objects - both very distant and in close proximity. The sun, for example, pulls you towards itself with a force of half a newton. If you are at a distance of several meters from your smartphone, then you are drawn to it not only by the desire to check the received messages, but also by the force of several piconewtons. This is roughly equal to the gravitational pull between you and the Andromeda galaxy, 2.5 million light-years away and trillions of times the mass of the sun.

If you want to get rid of gravity altogether, you can use a very tricky trick. All the masses that are around are constantly pulling us towards them, but how will they behave if you dig a very deep hole right to the center of the planet and go down there, somehow avoiding all the dangers that may occur on this long path? If we imagine that there is a cavity inside an ideally spherical Earth, then the force of attraction to its walls will be the same from all sides. And your body will suddenly find itself in weightlessness, in a suspended state - exactly in the middle of this cavity. So you may not feel the gravity of the Earth - but for this you need to be exactly inside it. These are the laws of physics, and nothing can be done about them.

Let's leave our sunny city and go mentally travel to the distant edges of the Universe.
It has already been said in this book that even in ancient times people called the stars motionless. Indeed, the entire firmament revolves around the Earth (you now know that this rotation is apparent). And one star from another is all the time at the same distance.
Here is the constellation Big Dipper... What figure formed it by seven stars two thousand years ago, it is the same now, it will remain the same for several thousand years.
However, the immobility of the stars is seeming: they are rushing with great speed in world space, but we do not notice their movements, since the stars are terribly far from us.
For several centuries, astronomers have tried to find out how far the stars are from us, and they could not do it.
In 1837, the director of the Pulkovo Observatory V. Ya. Struve managed to find the distance to the Begi star. It turned out that this star is about 1,700 thousand times farther from us than the Sun!
It was important to take the first step. Simultaneously with Struve and later, scientists found the distance to many stars.
Astronomers named the closest star to us Proxima, which means "Nearest" in Latin. Proxima (it is located in the constellation Centaurus) is a small star, it is visible only through a good telescope and only from the southern hemisphere of the Earth.
Let's calculate how soon you can get to Proxima.
Where are we going?
Let's imagine a fantastic picture.
A track has been laid to Proxima, and the first passenger train is waiting for the signal to depart. You and I, out of breath, run up to the checkout.
- Are there any more tickets to Proxima?
- Please. - the cashier answers calmly.
- Two tickets!
- Pay money.
- How much?
“I'll count it now,” the cashier says. - Since the path is long, the road authorities have set a price that is favorable to the public: one ruble for every million kilometers.
- It's just for nothing! - we are happily surprised.
- Wait a bit! - the cashier smiles. - So, one ruble per million kilometers is one hundred and fifty rubles per astronomical unit. And to Proxima two hundred and sixty thousand astronomical units, which means ... from you to thirty-nine million rubles, citizens!
We back away from the checkout in fright.
- And ... how long will the train go?
- Now we will calculate this too, - the cashier reassures us. - We send express - three hundred kilometers per hour. The way to the Sun would take fifty-eight years, and to Proxima two hundred and sixty thousand times farther ... In fifteen million years you will reach your goal, comrades!
- Will there be stations along the way?
- Hardly ... Is there any comet.

We shyly back away from the checkout.
“We’ll come back next time, when we’re more free ...
The cashier looks after us with sadness.
- Apparently, the flight will not take place. All passengers run away ...
It turns out that a train for interstellar travel is not a good thing at all. We remember the rocket. Suppose that such a fuel has already been invented, at which the speed of the rocket reaches 20 kilometers per second, 72,000 kilometers per hour.
Now you and I will find out that it is not at all profitable to fly in a rocket. Rocket speed 240 times more speed trains, which means that it will take 240 times less time. Divide 15 million by 240.

Though! Even a rocket will take 62,500 years to fly. How far the stars are from us!
It has already been said in this book that the fastest in the world is a light beam. Every second he runs a distance of 300 thousand kilometers - almost the same as from the Earth to the Moon. Now, if only to travel on a light beam!
The distance from the Earth to the Sun, that is, one astronomical unit, the light beam will run through in 8 minutes 20 seconds. There are 1440 minutes in a day, which is 173 times more than 8 minutes 20 seconds. This means that in a day light travels about 173 astronomical units, and in a year it will cover 63,000 astronomical units, that is, a path that is 63,000 times greater than the distance from the Earth to the Sun.
The distance that light travels in a year, astronomers called a light year, and this huge measure of length is used to measure distances in the Universe.
Indeed, the astronomical unit is good for the solar system, and when it comes to stellar distances, it becomes quite small. Even before Proxima, there are 260 thousand astronomical units, and there are stars that are thousands and even millions of times farther from the Earth. Measuring the distance to such stars in astronomical units is like measuring the distance from Moscow to Vladivostok in millimeters.
Remember firmly: the year is a measure of time, 365 and a quarter of a day; a light year is a measure of length, 63,000 astronomical units.
How many light years to Proxima? In one light year there are 63,000 astronomical units, and in total there are 260 thousand astronomical units to Proxima, which means that it is more than four light years before it. oskazkakh.ru - site
Here's another fantastic scene.
An expedition sent from Earth to Proxima got there. The travelers took a powerful radio transmitter with them and are talking to the Earth.
- Hello Hello! Proxima speaking! Earth, can you hear us?
- Hello, hello, says the Earth! We hear Proxima good! How was the travel?
- Very good! No special incidents happened on the way. We are waiting for people and food to be sent.
- Didn't you find habitable planets there?
- We haven't found it yet. They settled temporarily on one small planet, but nature on it is scarce and food is not suitable for earthly stomachs.
- Okay, we'll send passenger and transport ships... This concludes the conversation. Goodbye Proxima!
- Goodbye, Earth!
How long do you think this short conversation will take? More than 25 years! Between every question and getting an answer more eight years, since radio waves travel through space at the same speed as light.
Light with its colossal speed, 300 thousand kilometers per second, rushes from Proxima to us for more than four years. And there are stars that are immeasurably farther away.
The Universe is immensely great! And it is almost impossible to imagine how far away even the nearest stars are from us. Perhaps stories about the train, about the rocket, and talking on the radio will help you.
What a small universe the ancients imagined!
In one ancient Greek legend, it is said that the god Hephaestus dropped an anvil from the sky, and it flew to Earth for nine days and nine nights. To the ancient Greeks, this distance seemed incredibly large, and the falling object will pass only 580 thousand kilometers in nine days - this is a little farther than from the Earth to the Moon.
Even the solar system is thousands of times larger than the entire universe in the mind of the Greeks.

Each star system has clearly defined boundaries of the energy cocoon in which it is located. Our solar system is built on exactly the same principle. All the starry sky that we observe on the border of this cocoon is a holographic projection of exactly the same star systems located in our 3-dimensional space. The image of each star system in our sky has strictly individual parameters.

They are transmitted continuously and endlessly. The source of transmission and storage of information in space is absolutely pure and original light. There is not a single atom or photon of impurity in it that distorts its purity. Because of this, endless myriads of stars are available to us to contemplate. All star systems have their own strictly specified coordinates, written in the code of the primordial light.

The principle of operation is similar to the transmission of signals over a fiber-optic cable, only with the help of coded-light information. Each star system has its own code, with the help of which it receives a personal dedicated channel for transmitting and receiving information in the form of atoms and photons of light. This is the light that contains all the information coming from the original source. It has all its characteristics and qualities, as it is an integral part of it.

Star systems in our space have two entry-exit points for transmission - reception of light information about themselves and about the planets located in their zone of gravity.

(fig. 1)
Passing along the energy channels, through the sluice points (white balls in Fig. 2), their light and information about them fall into the zone of comparison and decoding of the orientation matrix. As a result of this, light information, already processed inside the stars, at the atomic level, is retransmitted further into our space, in the form of a finished holographic image. The figure shows how information gets into the Sun through light channels, after which it is retransmitted in the form of a holographic image of all stellar systems at the boundaries of the energy cocoon.


(fig. 2)
The fewer sluice points between star systems, the farther they are spaced from the entry-exit channel in our firmament.

The codes of stellar systems cannot yet be expressed using existing terrestrial technologies. Because of this, we have an absolutely incorrect and distorted idea of ​​the galaxy, the universe and space as a whole.
We consider space to be an endless abyss, scattering in different directions after an explosion. Delirium, delirium, and delirium again.
Space and our 3-dimensional space are very compact. It's hard to believe, but even harder to imagine. The main reason why we are not aware of this is due to the distorted perception of what we see in the firmament.
The infinity and depth of space that we are observing now should be perceived as an image in a cinema, and nothing more. We always see only a flat image relayed to the borders of our solar system. (see Fig. 1) Such a picture of events is generally not objective, and it completely distorts the real structure and structure of the cosmos as a whole.

The main purpose of this entire system is to carry out visual reception of information from a holographically retransmitted image, read atomic-light codes, decode them and further provide an opportunity for physical movement between stars through light channels. (See Fig. 3) Earthlings do not yet have these technologies ...

Any star system can be located from each other at a distance not exceeding its own diameter, which will be equal to the distance between the gateway points + the radius of the neighboring star system. The figure shows roughly how the space works if you look at it from the side, and not from the inside as we are used to seeing it.


(fig. 3)
Here's an example. The diameter of our solar system, according to our scientists, is about 1921.56 AU. This means that the stellar systems closest to us will be located at a distance of this radius, i.e. 960.78 AU + radius of the neighboring star system to the common gateway point. You feel how, in fact, everything is very compact and rationally arranged. Everything is much closer than we can imagine.

Now grasp the difference in numbers. The closest star to us according to existing technologies for calculating distances is Alpha Centauri. The distance to it was determined as 15,000 ± 700 AU. That is, against 960.78 AU + half the diameter of the Alpha Centauri stellar system itself. In terms of numbers, the error was 15.625 times. Isn't it a bit too much? After all, these are completely different orders of the distances that do not reflect objective reality.

How do they do it, I don't understand at all? Measure the distance to an object using a holographic image located on the screen of a huge cinema. Just tin! In addition to a sad smile, this does not cause anything for me personally.

This is how a delusional, unreliable, absolutely erroneous view of space and the entire universe as a whole develops.

And other planets. Looking at the sky, they were able to establish that the Moon, moving across the sky, obscures one or the other star, but the stars themselves are never in front. Sometimes the planets obscure the stars. This suggests that the stars are located farther than the planets.

But how next? even then he pointed out that the stars are very far from the Earth and therefore we cannot notice the displacement of the positions of the stars. But they must necessarily be due to the movement of the Earth together with the stars in world space.

Astronomers did not manage to see such motions of stars after about three centuries. Although during that period, great strides were made in the invention of instruments for observing the sky, as well as in the accuracy of observations. In the middle of the 18th century. famous scientists Bradley (in England) and Lambert (in Germany) have established that the distances to the stars closest to us are many times greater than the distances from the Earth to. But they did not succeed in finding out the exact distance to the stars.

For the first time in the history of science V. Ya. Struve measured. He measured the positions of Vega many times and came to the conclusion that Vega displaced in six months by an angle of about 1/4 of an arc second. At such a small angle from Vega, the diameter of the earth's orbit should be seen - in other words, twice the distance from the Earth to the Sun, and this distance itself should be at an angle of 1/8 of an arc second.

It is known that a circle is divided into 360 degrees of 60 arc minutes in each degree, each minute by 60 seconds. This means that there are 1,296,000 arc seconds in the circle.

If the radius of the Earth's orbit from Vega is at an angle of about 1/8 of a second, or about 1/10000000 of a circle (astronomers call this angle the parallax of this star), then the distance to this star is almost 250 trillion kilometers.

It is naturally inconvenient to use such numbers. Astronomers usually use larger units of length in such cases. For example light year... This is a short designation for the distance that a light beam travels in a period equal to an Earth year at a speed of about 300,000 km / s. A light year is approximately 9.5 trillion kilometers. Briefly, it can be written as follows: 9.5 x 10 to the 12th power of km.

Astronomers also use another system for measuring the distance to stars. If the circle contains 1,296,000 arc seconds, then the radian is 206,265 arc seconds (57 °, 3). If the radius of the Earth's orbit could be seen from some celestial body at an angle of 1 second of a circle, then this would indicate that the distance to such a body is 206,265 times the radius of the Earth's orbit, and is equal to about 31 trillion km or 374 light years. This value is called parallax-second or parsec.

Vega is located at a distance of 8 parsecs from us, or 26.5 light year... It would take forty million years for the TU-154 to fly such a distance.

Vega is indeed one of the stars relatively close to us, but not the closest. Of the brightest stars, the closest to us is the alpha star in the constellation Centaurus, invisible from the territory of Russia. She can be seen in southern countries... The light from it goes to us for 4.3 years.

To date, the distances to many thousands of stars have been established in this way.

But with all the accuracy that astronomers have achieved in measuring stellar parallaxes, this method is applicable only for determining distances to relatively close stars. For distant stars that are hundreds, thousands and tens of thousands of light years away from us, it is not suitable: the angles turn out to be so negligible (hundredths and thousandths of a second) that they cannot be measured. Astronomers have found other reliable ways to measure the distances of more distant stars. As a result, the exact distances of up to tens of thousands of individual stars are now known, and the distance to an even greater number of stars can be estimated approximately.

If the stars can be seen with unimaginable long distances, - which means that they must have a tremendous power of light (luminosity). The stars are suns that are very distant from us. Some of them emit much more light than our huge

The Milky Way is the galaxy in which the Earth is located,
all stars of the solar system and all stars visible to the naked eye
Panorama of the Milky Way taken in Death Valley, USA, 2005
Photo: National Park Service
The mass of the star Deneb is 200 times the mass of the Sun. It is more than a thousand light years from Earth. This means that the light of Deneb we see was emitted somewhere in the interval between the birth of the Roman Republic and the fall of the Western Roman Empire. Interesting facts from the life of stars lists KIRI2LL. On the endless expanses of the Internet, I somehow came across the following picture.
Of course, this small circle in the middle of the Milky Way is breathtaking and makes you think about many things, ranging from the frailty of life and ending with the limitless dimensions of the universe, but the question still arises: how much does it all correspond to reality?

Unfortunately, the compilers of the image did not indicate the radius of the yellow circle, and it is dubious to evaluate it by eye. Nevertheless, tweeters @FakeAstropix asked the same question as I did, and claim that this picture is correct for about 99% of the stars visible in the night sky.
Another question is, how many stars can you see in the sky without using optics? It is believed that up to 6,000 stars can be observed from the surface of the Earth with the naked eye. But in reality, this number will be much less - firstly, in the northern hemisphere we will physically be able to see no more than half of this amount (the same is true for residents of the southern hemisphere), and secondly, we are talking about ideal observation conditions, which in reality are practically impossible to achieve. What is only one light pollution of the sky. And when it comes to the farthest visible stars, then in most cases we need ideal conditions to notice them.

But still, which of the small twinkling dots in the sky are the farthest from us? Here's a list I've been able to compile so far (although I certainly wouldn't be surprised if I missed a lot, so don't be too harsh).

Deneb- the most bright Star in the constellation Cygnus and the twentieth brightest star in the night sky, with an apparent magnitude of +1.25 (it is believed that the visibility limit for the human eye is +6, maximum +6.5 for people with really excellent vision). This blue and white super-gagint, which lies at a distance from us at a distance of 1500 (the last estimate) to 2600 light years - thus, the light we see from Deneb was emitted somewhere in the interval between the birth of the Roman Republic and the fall of the Western Roman Empire.
Here and further, it should be borne in mind that, due to the low parallax, it is quite difficult to calculate the exact distance to such distant objects, therefore different sources can give different numbers.

Deneb's mass more mass our star is about 200 times the Sun, and the luminosity exceeds the solar minimum by 50,000 times. If he were in the place of Sirius, he would sparkle in our sky brighter than the full moon.

VV Cephei Ais one of the most big stars our galaxy. According to various estimates, its radius exceeds the solar one from 1000 to 1900 times. It lies 5,000 light years from the Sun. VV Cephei A is part of a binary system - its neighbor is actively pulling on the matter of the companion star. The apparent magnitude VV of Cepheus A is approximately +5.
P Swanis located from us at a distance of 5,000 to 6,000 light years. It is a bright blue variable hypergiant with a luminosity of 600,000 times that of the Sun. It is known for the fact that during the period of its observations, its apparent magnitude changed several times. The star was first discovered in the 17th century, when it suddenly became visible - then its magnitude was +3. After 7 years, the star's brightness decreased so much that it ceased to be visible without a telescope. In the 17th century, several more cycles of a sharp increase followed, and then an equally sharp decrease in luminosity, for which it was even called a constant nova. But in the 18th century, the star calmed down and since then its magnitude is about +4.8.

P Swan is highlighted in red

Mu CepheiAlso known as Herschel's Garnet Star, it is a red supergiant and arguably the largest star visible to the naked eye. Its luminosity exceeds the solar one from 60,000 to 100,000 times, the radius is latest estimates maybe 1500 times the sun. Mu Cephei is 5500-6000 light years away. The star is at the end of its life path and soon (by astronomical standards) time will turn into a supernova. Its apparent magnitude varies from +3.4 to +5. It is believed to be one of the reddest stars in the northern sky.

Plaskett's Staris located at a distance of 6,600 light years from Earth in the constellation of the Unicorn and is one of the most massive systems double stars v The milky way... Star A has a mass of 50 solar masses and a luminosity 220,000 times that of our star. Star B has about the same mass, but its luminosity is less - "only" at 120,000 solar. The apparent magnitude of star A is +6.05, which means it can theoretically be seen with the naked eye.
System This Kielis located at a distance of 7500 - 8000 light years from us. It consists of two stars, the main of which is the bright blue variable, is one of the largest and most unstable stars in our galaxy with a mass of about 150 solar masses, 30 of which the star has already shed. In the 17th century, Eta Carina had the fourth magnitude, by 1730 it had become one of the brightest in the constellation Carina, but by 1782 it had again become very weak. Then, in 1820, a sharp increase in the brightness of the star began and in April 1843 it reached an apparent magnitude of −0.8, becoming for a time the second brightest in the sky after Sirius. Thereafter, the brightness of Eta Carinae plummeted, and by 1870 the star had become invisible to the naked eye.
However, in 2007, the brightness of the star increased again, it reached magnitude +5 and became visible again. The star's current luminosity is estimated to be at least a million solar, and it appears to be a prime candidate for the next supernova in the Milky Way. Some even believe that it has already exploded.
Ro Cassiopeiais one of the most distant stars visible to the naked eye. It is an extremely rare yellow hypergiant, with a luminosity half a million times greater than that of the Sun and a radius 400 times greater than that of our star. According to the latest estimates, it is located at a distance of 8,200 light years from the Sun. Usually its stellar magnitude is +4.5, but on average, once every 50 years, the star dims for several months, and the temperature of its outer layers decreases from 7000 to 4000 degrees Kelvin. The last such incident occurred in late 2000 - early 2001. According to calculations, during these several months, the star ejected matter, the mass of which was 3% of the mass of the Sun.
V762 Cassiopeiais probably the farthest star visible from Earth to the naked eye - at least based on currently available data. There is little information about this star. It is known to be a red supergiant. According to the latest data, it is located at a distance of 16,800 light years from us. Its apparent magnitude ranges from +5.8 to +6, so you can see the star just in ideal conditions.

In conclusion, it is worth mentioning that in history there have been cases when people had the opportunity to observe much more distant stars. For example, in 1987 in the Large Magellanic Cloud, located 160,000 light years away, a supernova broke out that could be seen with the naked eye. Another thing is that, unlike all the supergiants listed above, it could be observed for a much shorter period of time.