"Giant
Stars"
Hubble Space
Telescope's Irish Operator in Dublin
Getting to use the most
expensive telescope ever built is a rare privilege that Irishman Dr. Brian Espey
was fortunate to experience. We are also fortunate enough to
have Dr Espey present us with his fascinating lecture this
Monday night (May 10th) for Astronomy Ireland's Summer
Lecture.
In his lecture Dr. Espey will teach
us about the effects that the strong winds from huge stars within our Universe
have on our planets. Stars with masses similar to our own Sun pass through an
evolutionary Red Giant stage towards the end of their lives releasing a huge
amount of gas in the form of a stellar wind. A
Red Giant is a huge star hundreds of times the size of the Sun.
Click
HERE for an impressive visual aid which compares the
size of our own star, the Sun, to Red Giants, Betelgeuse and
Antares.
Despite the importance of this
process in the evolution of stars, and the next generations of stars, planets,
and life, very little is known of the details of Red Giants and this cosmic
wind. For example, did you know that;
-
A Red Giant is a star which is
close to the end of its life.
-
When a star becomes a Red Giant it can expand to over 200
times it's previous size.
-
In about five billion years our Sun will become a Red
Giant.
-
When this happens it will expand out to Earth's orbit,
engulfing our planet.
-
The Sun will be 10 billion years old before it becomes a
Red Giant, yet it will only spend a few million years in this stage.
-
Almost all of the elements in the Universe heavier than
helium were made in Red Giant stars, including the oxygen we breath and the
carbon we are made of.
-
At the end of its life a Red Giant will shed most of its
outer atmosphere, creating a spectacular Planetary
Nebula.
Within the talk Dr. Espey will
present results of his research detailing the process he uses - data from
telescopes on Earth as well as data from the Hubble Space Telescope
(HST).
Dr Espey is a physics and astrophysics lecturer in
Trinity College Dublin (TCD), as well as a research associate with the School of
Cosmic Physics, Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies (DIAS). He has given lectures for Astronomy Ireland in the past
which have proved to be a great success and extremely interesting, so don't
miss this event!