Nasa captures incredible image of star '5000 times brighter than the Sun'
manchestereveningnews.co.ukSpace scientists say they have spotted a cosmic "lawn sprinkler". NASA says their Hubble Space Telescope has provided "a dramatic and colourful" close-up look at one of the "most rambunctious stars in our galaxy".
Located approximately 700 light-years away, a binary star system called R Aquarii has been observed undergoing violent eruptions that blast out huge filaments of glowing gas, "weaving a huge spiral pattern among the stars." NASA said: "The twisted stellar outflows make the region look like a lawn sprinkler gone berserk." The space agency adds that it dramatically demonstrates how the universe redistributes the products of nuclear energy that form deep inside stars and jet back into space. READ MORE: Scientists search for signs of 'alien intelligence' in nearby solar system R Aquarii belongs to a class of double stars called symbiotic stars.
The primary star is an aging red giant and its companion is a compact burned-out star known as a white dwarf. The red giant primary star is classified as a Mira variable that is over 400 times larger than our Sun.
NASA said: "The bloated monster star pulsates, changes temperature, and varies in brightness by a factor of 750 times over a roughly 390-day period.
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