How old? - Multiverse - Solar Week Message Board

Solar Week - Ask a Question

Come here during Solar Week (next one: March 22-26, 2021) to interact. To post a question, click on your area of interest from the topics below, and then click on the "Ask New Question" button. Or EMAIL or tweet or plant in Answer Garden your question about the Sun or life as a scientist to us -- and watch for it to appear here. You can also visit our FAQs (frequently asked questions). In between Solar Weeks in October and March, you can view all the archives here.

Forums
Search Forum
Advanced SearchTopicsPosts

Prev Go to previous topic

Go to next topic

Last Post 3/20/2008 4:27 PM by Paulett Liewer

How old?

3 Replies

Sort:


You are not authorized to post a reply.

Author

Messages

Anonymous

Posts:

3/18/2008 8:58 AM
How old is the oldest star today? Is it hard to see? - Katie H. (FWMS)

Paulett Liewer

Basic Member

Posts:113

3/18/2008 9:59 AM
I just googled "oldest star" and got a great hit: The oldest star in our galaxy (the Milky Way) is designated HE0107-5240. It is in the direction of a southern constellation, Phoenix, and is about 36,000 light years away -- that means the light from this star takes 36,000 years to reach us. You can read more about it at http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/h...e/nature/2381935.stm

Anonymous

Posts:

3/19/2008 8:58 AM
Isn't the milky way more then one star? Sophia G-R (FWMS)

Paulett Liewer

Basic Member

Posts:113

3/20/2008 4:27 PM
The Milky Way - our galaxy - has many, many, many stars! Scientists estimate it contains about 100 billion (100,000,000,000). If you go up in the mountains away from the light pollution of cities, you can see a few thousand stars with the naked eye. You can also see the dust because it obscures some stars. There a nice picture at http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap990224.html and another nice picture in infrared light at http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/milky_way.html. Paulett