{"id":2991,"date":"2011-09-22T12:12:29","date_gmt":"2011-09-22T02:12:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/scienceillustrated.com.au\/blog\/?p=2991"},"modified":"2011-09-22T12:12:29","modified_gmt":"2011-09-22T02:12:29","slug":"which-star-is-the-largest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/scienceillustrated.com.au\/blog\/science\/space\/which-star-is-the-largest\/","title":{"rendered":"Which star is the largest?"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_2992\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"width: 480px\"><a href=\"https:\/\/scienceillustrated.com.au\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/09\/VY_Canis_Majoris.jpeg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-2992 \" title=\"VY Canis Majoris measures 2,600 times larger than the Sun. Image: NASA\" src=\"https:\/\/scienceillustrated.com.au\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/09\/VY_Canis_Majoris.jpeg\" alt=\"\" width=\"480\" height=\"480\" srcset=\"https:\/\/scienceillustrated.com.au\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/09\/VY_Canis_Majoris.jpeg 600w, https:\/\/scienceillustrated.com.au\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/09\/VY_Canis_Majoris-150x150.jpeg 150w, https:\/\/scienceillustrated.com.au\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/09\/VY_Canis_Majoris-300x300.jpeg 300w, https:\/\/scienceillustrated.com.au\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/09\/VY_Canis_Majoris-50x50.jpeg 50w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 480px) 100vw, 480px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-caption-text\">VY Canis Majoris measures 2,600 times larger than the Sun. Image: NASA<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><strong>The red hypergiant VY Canis Majoris holds the current distinction for being the largest star ever observed, in terms of volume, measuring 2,600 times larger than the Sun.<!--more--><span style=\"font-weight: normal;\">This giant shines much more brightly than the Sun&#8211;up to a half-million times as luminous. It can be found in the constellation Canis Major, but in spite of its size and brilliance it cannot be seen with the naked eye because it is 4,900 light-years away. Stars that size live hard and die young. After only a few million years&#8211;a short time for a star&#8211;there was little hydrogen left to fuel VY Canis Majori&#8217;s core. Once the hydrogen was depleted, the star&#8217;s core collapsed and got hotter while its outer layers swelled and its surface cooled, transforming it into the red hypergiant we see today.<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong><span style=\"font-weight: normal;\"> <\/span><\/strong>Due to its size, VY Canis Mayoris is very unstable, and over the past thousand years it has ejected large masses of matter. Sometime in the next 100,000 years, VC Canis Majoris will explode as a supernova&#8211;leaving just a neutron star or a black hole behind.<\/p>\n<p>Got a burning science question? Send it to letters@scienceillustrated.com.au<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The red hypergiant VY Canis Majoris holds the current distinction for being the largest star ever observed, in terms of volume, measuring 2,600 times larger than the Sun.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[52,62,38,29,27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2991","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ask-us","category-astrophysics","category-nasa","category-night-sky","category-space"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/scienceillustrated.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2991"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/scienceillustrated.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/scienceillustrated.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scienceillustrated.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scienceillustrated.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2991"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/scienceillustrated.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2991\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2993,"href":"https:\/\/scienceillustrated.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2991\/revisions\/2993"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/scienceillustrated.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2991"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scienceillustrated.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2991"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scienceillustrated.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2991"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}