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More massive stars "live fast and die young". Our Sun is about 4.5 billion years old, and is perhaps halfway through its life. The giant star Betelgeuse is perhaps 100 times more massive, thousands of times larger, millions of times brighter, and is probably no more than 10 million years old. When Betelgeuse formed, there were probably pre-human hominids watching!
And yet, Betelgeuse is dying; it will probably go supernova within the next 10,000 years. It could happen tonight! (Of course, we wouldn't know it for another 650 years, while the light travels here.....)
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∙ 13y ago
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Is a short life span high mass medium mass or low mass?
high mass has shortest life (stars right?)
What determines the life cycles of stars?
Mainly their mass.
What is a low- meduim- mass star the becomes the end of its life?
White dwarf. High mass stars become neutron stars or black holes.
What type of life cycle do stars with more mass have?
The more the mass the shorter their life cycle (the more quickly they use their fuel)
How is a stars life?
A star's "life cycle" depends mostly on its initial mass; everything is determined by mass. Small, low-mass stars may shine essentially forever, while very large high-mass stars may grow old and go supernova in only a few dozen million years.
What is the most important factor in determining a stars life cycle?
The most important factor is the stars mass.
How does a stars mass affect its life cycle?
The more massive a star is, the less its life time.
What does a stars life depend upon?
Its mass - the larger its mass the shorter its life.The smallest and least massive stars can last for trillions of years, whereas a massive star may end its life in millions of years.
Is a stars eventual fate determined by its initial mass or by the mass it has at the end of it's life?
Ultimately the mass a star has at the end of its life depends on its initial mass. This mass determines what stages a star will go through in its death throws.
The life cycle path followed by a star is determined by the stars initial?
Mass and size
What stars have the longer life span?
The smaller stars generally live longer due to less mass & less hydrogen is burned.
Does smaller mass stars have a greater luminosity than larger mass stars?
This is not necessarily true. most of the time stars with a larger diameter have more mass but some stars with a smaller diameter are more dense and have a greater mass. Find a main sequence star chart and you can compare the data.
