Danny Lewis is a multimedia journalist working in print, radio, and illustration. Professor Lawrence Molnar of the Calvin College’s Dept. Nobody has ever predicted a nova explosion before. Researchers including those from Apache Point Observatory and the University of Wyoming in the US said that the change to the night sky will be visible to the naked eye. And for a time, the event will generate one of the brightest points in the night sky. Titled “Luminous“, the documentary – which is directed by Sam Smartt, a Calvin professor of communication arts and sciences – chronicles the process that led Prof. Molnar and his team to make this unprecedented discovery. The star star system, known as KIC 9832227, is a contact binary system, that is two stars so close in space that they are touching. “We get a predicted explosion date of 2022, give or take a year,” Larry Molnar, an astronomer at Calvin College, said during a presentation at the American Astronomical Society, Drake reports. Cookie Policy According to study from a team of researchers from Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan, a binary star system that will likely merge and explode in 2022. It’s only been recently, thanks to ongoing improvements in instrumentation and technology, that astronomers have been able to observe such mergers taking place. You won’t need a telescope to tell me in 2023 whether I was wrong or I was right.”. As Molnar explained it: “Most big scientific projects are done in enormous groups with thousands of people and billions of dollars. The merging of stars, Drake reports, will make them 10,000 times brighter than they are now. This binary star system, which is known as KIC 9832227, is one that Prof. Molnar and his colleagues – which includes students from the Apache Point Observatory and the University of Wyoming – have been monitoring since 2013. According to study from a team of researchers from Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan, a binary star system that will likely merge and explode in 2022. While novae are pretty hard to predict, this instance is one of the first times that astronomers have felt confident enough that their subjects will collide in the near future to put out a statement, Daniel Clery reports for Science magazine. Fonts by Typekit and Monotype. Bottom line: Astronomer Larry Molnar and colleagues are predicted that the two stars in the KIC 9832227 binary system will merge and explode around … Molnar's prediction is that a binary star (two stars orbiting each other) he is monitoring will merge and explode in 2022, give or take a year; at which time the star will increase its brightness ten thousand fold, becoming one of the brighter stars in the heavens for a time. The star will be visible as part of the constellation Cygnus, and it appear as an addition star in the familiar Northern Cross star pattern (see above). Terms of Use Astronomers are predicting that binary star system KIC 9832227, located in the Cygnus constellation, will merge and explode in a “red nova” event in 2022. explode in 2022, give or take a year; at which time the star will increase its brightness ten thousand fold, becoming one of the brighter stars in the heavens for a time. It’s been done using a small telescope, with one professor and a few students looking for something that is not likely. “Bottom line is we really think our merging star hypothesis should be taken seriously right now and we should be using the next few years to study this intensely so that if it does blow up we will know what led to that explosion,” Molnar said in his presentation, Byrd reports. Just five years from now a pair of stars are predicted to merge, forming a glittery and bright new point in the sky A model of the binary star system KIC 9832227… It’s free to join, sign up now! Over the course of the year, Molnar and his colleagues will be monitoring KIC 9832227 carefully, and in multiple wavelengths. The star will be visible in the constellation Cygnus and will add a star to the Northern Cross star pattern. See our User Agreement, Privacy Policy and Cookie Statement. Two stars will NOT merge and explode into red fury in 2022 Well, two stars may merge somewhere, but probably not the two stars you were thinking of. He focuses on stories with a health/science bent and has reported some of his favorite pieces from the prow of a canoe. This is … Who Was Ida O'Keeffe, Georgia's Lesser-Known, But Perhaps More-Talented, Sister? That will make it easily one of the brightest in the sky. As a Futurism reader, we invite you join the Singularity Global Community, our parent company’s forum to discuss futuristic science & technology with like-minded people from all over the world. But if seeing a star explode before you die is on your to-do list, don't lose hope yet. Then we knew we were looking at the right thing. Located about 1,800 light-years away, the star system KIC 9832227 has long been a focus of study. Believing that KIC 9832227 would undergo a similar fate, they began conducting tests to see if the star system was exhibiting the same behavior. And if it happens as predicted , its brightness will increase by 10,000-fold, making it one of the brightest objects in the night sky and easily visible with the naked eye, according to a Calvin College news release. Molnar’s prediction says a binary star he is monitoring will merge and explode in 2022. But at Calvin it’s only my risk, and I can use my work on interesting, open-ended questions to bring extra excitement into my classroom. Calvin College professor Larry Molnar predicts a binary star (two stars orbiting each other) will merge and explode in 2022, give or take a year. Get the best of Smithsonian magazine by email. Molnar also expects that amateur astronomers will be able to monitor the pair’s orbital timing and variations in brightness. The first step was to make spectroscopic observations to see if their observations could be explained by the presence of a companion star. This is an historic find, since it will allow astronomers to witness a stellar merger and explosion for the first time in history. When Molnar and his colleagues first started studying the star system in 2013, all they knew was that it flickered—it was unclear whether it was a pulsing star, or a spinning set of binary stars. Advertising Notice In 2022—only a few years from now—an odd type of exploding star called a red nova will appear in our skies in 2022. Two stars will merge into one, pushing out excess gas into an explosion known as a red nova. But the two stars that make up KIC 9832227 will merge into one, generating gas that forms an explosion known as a red nova. Danny is based in Brooklyn, NY. In addition, they predict that the burst of light it will cause will be bright enough to be seen from Earth. The noticeable flickering came from the fact that the stars are aligned in such a way that they periodically eclipse each other in relation to the Earth, dimming and brightening as they spin. Give a Gift. The findings were presented at the 229th Meeting of the American Astronomical Society (AAS). The next step was to measure the pair’s orbital period, to see it was in fact getting shorter over time – which would indicate that the stars were moving closer to each other. This is an historic case, since no astronomer has ever been able to accurately predict when and where a stellar collision would take place in the past. or SpaceX’s Starlink Satellites Ruined This Photo of the NEOWISE Comet, This Star Appears to Have Survived a Supernova, Proposed Mission Would Explore Interstellar Object ‘Oumuamua, Scientists Discover “Peculiar” Teardrop-Shaped Star, Scientists: SpaceX Satellites Threaten “Astronomy Itself”, Researchers Find 2,000 Plastic Bags Inside Camel, FBI Arrests Man for Plotting to Bomb Data Center, Cause Huge Internet Outage, Scientists Discover “Doomsday Glacier” More Unstable Than Ever. Keep up-to-date on: © 2021 Smithsonian Magazine. In 2017, some Astronomers claimed that two stars 1900 light years away would explode producing a very bright spot in the night sky. (Inside Science) -- Calling all amateur astronomers -- mark your calendars for 2022, give or take a year. “It is not a secure result, but not implausible either.”. This is exactly what just happened with one of the most anticipated astronomical events of the upcoming decade: the visible merger and fiery explosion of a pair of nearby binary stars in 2022. Continue Stellar collisions are an amazingly rare thing. It’s a high-risk proposal. This binary pair also had a shared atmosphere; and over time, their orbital period kept decreasing until (in 2008) they unexpectedly collided and exploded. This project is just the opposite. And if he’s right, stargazers will have a new phenomenon to watch for months to come. After conducting their own observations using the Calvin observatory, Prof. Molnar and his colleagues concluded that the star was a  contact binary – a class of binary star where the two stars are close enough to share an atmosphere. That's when two orbiting stars near the swan-shaped constellation Cygnus are set to merge and then explode, creating a new point of light in the night sky, which is expected to be as bright as the North Star for up to six months. To be a part of this research, I don’t know any other place where I would get an opportunity like that; Calvin is an amazing place.”. It took most of the summer to analyze the data, but it was so exciting. By Jake Parks | … Copyright ©, Singularity Education Group All Rights Reserved. This led to questions about the nature of this star system – specifically, whether it was a pulsar or a binary pair. Privacy Statement Contact binary star KIC 9832227 is predicted to merge and explode into a red nova in about five years. GRAND RAPIDS, Mich.— Two West Michigan astronomers from Calvin College have a groundbreaking theory. That would have been a pedestrian, boring explanation. In the years since, Molnar has become confident enough in his team’s findings that he predicted the two stars would merge and go nova sometime around 2022. This will be the first naked eye nova in decades. These observatories will study the star’s radio, infrared and X-ray emissions, respectively. The closer they looked, however, the more apparent it became that KIC 9832227 was made up of two stars that are so close to each other that they share an atmosphere, Clery reports. 229th Meeting of the American Astronomical Society, A Precise Prediction of a Stellar Merger and Red Nova Outburst. Once it explodes, the nova should be visible for most of the year. This is an historic find, since it will allow astronomers to witness a stellar merger and explosion for the first time in history. The duo have been moving ever closer to one another, and researchers believe they will soon merge in an explosive event known as a nova. An amateur astronomer in Japan has spotted an exploding star in a constellation in the northern sky – and its glow is visible now.. A Japanese amateur astronomer, Yuji Nakamura of Kameyama City, Mie Prefecture, found a new object in Cassiopeia on 18 March – and it’s believed to be a ‘nova’ explosion. The pair of glittery specks in this binary star system have been circling around each one another for years but it wasn't till recently that scientists even realized the single flickering spot represented two stars, Nadia Drake reports for National Geographic. He predicts KIC 9832227 will collide and explode in 2022. Credit: calvin.edu As of yet, no one has ever witnessed this phenomena in action – but that may be about to change! By 2015, Prof. Molnar and his team determined that the stars would eventually collide, resulting in a kind of stellar explosion known as a “Red Nova”. While this kind of prediction has never been made before, he says the data gathered from studying the star extremely close to another binary system that went nova in 2008, Deborah Byrd reports for EarthSky. When that happens, the brightness of the combined star will increase by more than 10,000 times! Five years from now, one of the night sky’s most visible constellations, Cygnus the swan, could get a new addition—the result of a distant star system exploding. The colliding stars will become 10,000 times brighter than they are now and could rival the intensity of the North Star, Polaris, which is the 50th brightest star in the night sky. And if he and his team’s predictions are correct, every student and stargazer in the northern hemisphere – not to mention people who just happen to be out for a walk – will be privy to the amazing light show. 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