Astronomy

UY Scuti – a Red Supergiant Star

UY Scuti – a Red Supergiant Star

UY Scuti is a red supergiant (RSG) star. It is considered one of the largest known stars by radius and is also a pulsating variable star, with a maximum brightness of magnitude 8.29 and a minimum of magnitude 10.56. It is located in or galaxy the Milky Way, at about 5.219 light-years away from Earth. It is a pulsating variable star in the constellation Scutum and one of the largest known stars in the Milky Way Galaxy. It has an absolute magnitude of -6.2, UY Scuti is thus 340.000 times more luminous than our Sun. It has an estimated radius of 1,708 solar radii, thus a volume nearly 5 billion times that of the Sun. It is also one of the most luminous and well-known of its kind.

UY Scuti is a red supergiant star located in the constellation Scutum. The pulsation of UY Scuti has a period of about 740 days. The star has an estimated average median radius of 1,708 times that of the Sun or a diameter of 2.4 trillion m (1.5 billion mi; 15.9 AU); thus a volume 5 billion times that of the Sun. It is one of the largest known stars, discovered since 1860. However, the star was better documented in 2012 with the help of greater technological equipment. The temperature on UY Scuti is estimated to be around 3,365 K.

UY Scuti is located a few degrees north of the A-type star Gamma Scuti and northeast of the Eagle Nebula. It has a radius of 1.1883 billion km / 0.7383 billion mi, and an enormous diameter of 2.3765 billion km / 1.4766 billion mi or around 7 AU across. Although the star is very luminous, it is, at its brightest, only 9th magnitude as viewed from Earth, due to its distance and location in the Zone of Avoidance within the Cygnus rift. It is believed that UY Scuti has begun to fuse helium and will eventually go supernova.

Situated in the Milky Way galaxy in the Scutum constellation, UY Scuti is 5.100 light-years away from us. It is about 2.9 kiloparsecs (9,500 light-years) from Earth, so it is one of the nearest known hypergiants. It is situated just northeast of the famous Eagle Nebula. If placed at the center of the Solar system, its photosphere would engulf the orbit of Jupiter. Regardless, UY Scuti is still one of the biggest known stars and if UY Scuti were placed in the Solar System, replacing our sun, its photosphere would reach the orbit of Saturn. The radius is not known for certain and may be larger than the orbit of Saturn.

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