Meet Mira, a star with a tail.
(Click photo to embiggen)
Astronomers using a NASA space telescope, the Galaxy Evolution Explorer, have spotted an amazingly long comet-like tail behind a star streaking through space. The star, named Mira after the Latin word for “wonderful,” has been a favorite of astronomers for about 400 years, yet this is the first time the tail has been seen.
Some interesting facts about Mira:
- The tail is 13 light-years long
- This is about 20,000 times the average distance of Pluto from the sun.
- Nothing like this has ever been seen around a star before now
- This tail material has been forming over the past 30,000 years.
- Mira is traveling through space at 291,000 miles per hour
- Mira has a traveling companion, though to be a white dwarf
- They are moving through the constellation Cetus 350 light-years from Earth
What an amazing and beautiful place is this universe we call home. Although ‘home’ may seem too small a word to house the enormity of it. The only thing more amazing and beautiful is the circle of the mind, which can contain the vastness of the universe. If infinity exists anywhere, it surely exists in the human mind.
Reading about Mira, and meditating on all the wonders and mysteries of the cosmos, provided a much needed escape from things today.
Happy Friday, everyone!
You’re absolutely right, we do live in an amazing and beautiful universe. (And I love your invention of “embiggen”!)
Ah, I wish I could take credit for that word. But I stole it from the Simpsons,
Jebediah coined the town motto. “Mr. Springfield, how can I hope to achieve such greatness?” A noble spirit embiggens the smallest man.
Wow! Mira truly is wonderful and quite beautiful too! I hope the things you were taking a break from yesterday seem as far away as Mira’s tail today.
Have a fantastic weekend.