R Aquarii belongs to a category of double stars known as symbiotic stars. It features a red giant, which is over 400 times larger than the Sun and classified as a Mira variable, alongside a dense white dwarf. The red giant pulsates, varies in brightness up to 750 times over approximately 390 days, and can shine nearly 5,000 times brighter than the Sun at its peak.
The white dwarf periodically draws in hydrogen from its companion during its 44-year orbital cycle. This material accumulates on the dwarf's surface until it triggers a nuclear fusion, leading to a massive explosion akin to a colossal hydrogen bomb. The resulting blast sends geysers of plasma outward, forming complex loops and trails shaped by magnetic fields and traveling at over 1 million miles per hour.
Hubble's first observations of R Aquarii in 1990 revealed the system's two bright stars separated by roughly 1.6 billion miles. Recent data, spanning 2014 to 2023, presents a timelapse of the dramatic changes in the binary star and its surrounding nebula, displaying the intense pulsations and evolving patterns of gas and light.
The sheer extent of these explosive outflows is immense, with material reaching up to 248 billion miles from the star pair, over 24 times the diameter of our solar system. Such insights from Hubble are helping to reshape our understanding of rare stellar phenomena like the eruptions observed in R Aquarii.
Related Links
Hubble Space Telescope
Stellar Chemistry, The Universe And All Within It
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