The new record holder for fastest star is called S4716, and it orbits around the center of the universe where the Milky Way is located.
Scientists found that S4716 orbited the black hole, which is 23.5 million kilometers, and the star orbits around it for just 4 years, and it can travel 5,000 miles per second. The University of Cologne and the University of Masaryk discovered this star and to be able to see you would need 5 telescopes.
In an article on psy.org the writer states, “[t]he telescopes included NIR2 and OSIRIS in Hawaii, and the European Southern Observatory’s SINFONI, NACO, and GRAVITY telescopes.” The scientists also found out that the S4716 is about 100 astronomical units which is 14,959,787,000 kilometers!
The leader of this study, Dr Florian Peissker, said, “[f]or a star to be in a stable orbit so close and fast in the vicinity of a supermassive black hole was completely unexpected and marks the limit that can be observed with traditional telescopes.”
This study has been going on for 20 years and they found out the speed which is 8,000 kilometers per second. In the same article is states “The S4716 is part of a densely packed group of stars called the S-star cluster or Sagittarius A* cluster which contains around 100 fast-moving stars.” This means that the S4716 is not only one star, it’s a group of stars or a cluster of stars.
The universe is full of mysteries and wonder yet to come, but scientists are researching and discovering new things every day. This study of the star S4716 took 20 years to analyze and is now one of the fastest stars in the whole world.
Link to article: Astronomers discover ‘fastest’ star in known universe – CBBC Newsround.pdf
Scientists found that S4716 orbited the black hole, which is 23.5 million kilometers, and the star orbits around it for just 4 years, and it can travel 5,000 miles per second. The University of Cologne and the University of Masaryk discovered this star and to be able to see you would need 5 telescopes.
In an article on psy.org the writer states, “[t]he telescopes included NIR2 and OSIRIS in Hawaii, and the European Southern Observatory’s SINFONI, NACO, and GRAVITY telescopes.” The scientists also found out that the S4716 is about 100 astronomical units which is 14,959,787,000 kilometers!
The leader of this study, Dr Florian Peissker, said, “[f]or a star to be in a stable orbit so close and fast in the vicinity of a supermassive black hole was completely unexpected and marks the limit that can be observed with traditional telescopes.”
This study has been going on for 20 years and they found out the speed which is 8,000 kilometers per second. In the same article is states “The S4716 is part of a densely packed group of stars called the S-star cluster or Sagittarius A* cluster which contains around 100 fast-moving stars.” This means that the S4716 is not only one star, it’s a group of stars or a cluster of stars.
The universe is full of mysteries and wonder yet to come, but scientists are researching and discovering new things every day. This study of the star S4716 took 20 years to analyze and is now one of the fastest stars in the whole world.
Link to article: Astronomers discover ‘fastest’ star in known universe – CBBC Newsround.pdf
