In the galaxy there were still a strangely twinkling star. Using a telescope in Chile, astronomers have discovered a star whose strange flickering — alternating bright and dim lights — like a star Tabby, which has long been associated with alien buildings.
“We don’t know what it is,” says astronomer Roberto Saito. “And it’s fun.”
The star can be a kind of debris in orbit, which periodically block the starlight, but Saito and colleagues say that we need to do more research to see what else can be caused by flickering.
Scientists engaged in the search for supernova — stars which suddenly flash, when to explode, when suddenly discovered an object in the VISTA telescope in the Atacama desert in Northern Chile. Instead of flash, this star dimmed. Scientists call it VVV-WIT-07, and part of the name can be deciphered as “What is that?”.
Star Tabby number two?
From 2010 to 2018 brightness of the stars grew and fell no particular order. It strongly resembled the star Table, except that the light VVV-WIT-07 falling by 80%, while the star light Tabby dimmed only 20%.
The detection of several stars that periodically fade, may mean that this flicker should be relatively common, says astronomer Tabetha Boyajian.
“If this phenomenon is the same as what is happening with the star Tabby, we can assume that they have a simple explanation. If you start to see these stars everywhere, it is normal for nature. It’s cool.”
However, it is not yet convinced that the stars have the same reasons for flicker.
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