The ESA team searched for stars with properties similar to those of our Sun, such as similar temperatures, surface gravities, compositions, masses, and radii.
They discovered 5863 stars that met their requirements. This also raises the possibility of discovering a habitable planet like Earth among the 5863 stars that are comparable to our Sun, which offers some hope for the continuation of life as we know it.
The Sun won't last forever, but scientists can now foresee what lies in store for the star that sustains our solar system. Even though we won't be present to see it, it's crucial to comprehend the circumstances.
By detecting stars with similar mass and composition and forecasting how our Sun will grow in the future, the European Space Agency's (ESA) star mapping GAIA mission now provides us with a glimpse into the Sun's future. Despite the fact that Earth has a shorter lifetime than the Sun, let's find out what lies ahead.
We already know that the Sun is powered by "Nuclear Fusion." Over the next few billion years, the Sun will continue to get hotter and hotter until its core eventually runs out of hydrogen. After then, the core will shrink and draw in hydrogen, creating a hydrogen shell.
While the Sun's core is busily contracting, its outer atmosphere will start to grow significantly. As a result, Earth and Mars could be completely engulfed, turning the Sun into a Red Giant.
All of the Sun's outer material will eventually be ejected as its core runs out of hydrogen and helium, forming a planetary nebula while the core collapses into a white dwarf.
Although this is based on how other stars have changed over time, it is crucial for people on Earth to at least have a general understanding of how our planet and the Sun will develop in the future.
The GAIA project
The third and most recent data release (DR3) from the ESA's GAIA mission provides some details on the Sun's life cycle. "A database containing the inherent characteristics of hundreds of millions of stars was one of the key outcomes of this publication. These characteristics include their temperature, size, and the mass they contain."
The Hertzsprung-Russell (H-R) diagram is used by the GAIA mission to overlay correct measurements of a star's apparent brightness and colour from Earth into a single diagram.
The effective surface temperature of a star is shown versus its intrinsic brightness on an HR diagram. By doing this, it demonstrates how stars change throughout the course of their lengthy lives.
The sort of nuclear fusion events occurring in the star's core determines how much its temperature and size fluctuate as it ages, even if a star's mass changes very little over the course of its existence. Our Sun, which has been around for 4.57 billion years, is stable and in its middle age.
However, this steadiness will alter as time goes on and Sun ages. The most recent data (DR3) from the GAIA mission are useful in this situation.
The data was scoured by Orlagh Creevey, Observatoire de la Côte d'Azur, France, and associates from Gaia's Coordination Unit 8 in search of the most precise star observations the spacecraft could provide. Because these stars are largely similar to the Sun, whose surface temperature is 6000K, they focused their research on stars with surface temperatures between 3000K and 10000K. Additionally, because they have lived the longest of any stars in the Galaxy, they can shed light on the Milky Way's past. Additionally, they offer hope for discovering exoplanets.
The scientists then narrowed down the data to only display stars with the Sun-like mass and chemical make-up. The stars they chose ultimately traced a line across the H-R diagram that illustrates the evolution of our Sun from its history into its future since they were able to vary the age. It demonstrated how the Sun's warmth and luminosity will change as it matures.
According to the findings, our Sun will reach its peak temperature at roughly 8 billion years old, then it will cool off, grow bigger, and eventually turn into a red giant star at around 10 to 11 billion years old. When the Sun eventually transforms into a faint white dwarf, its life will come to an end.
How much time does Earth have?
Earth has a lot shorter time than the Sun, with only 1 billion years remaining in its existence, compared to its 8 billion years. This is due to the Sun's brightness and temperature increasing by 10% per billion years. While this increase may seem small, it will result in Earth becoming too hot for any kind of life to exist on the planet.
Orlagh and colleagues searched for stars that were similar to the Sun in terms of their surface gravities, compositions, masses, and radii.
They discovered 5863 stars that met their requirements. This also raises the possibility of discovering a habitable planet like Earth among the 5863 stars that are comparable to our Sun, which offers some hope for the continuation of life as we know it.
We do not currently know if there is a planet that can support life, but we are actively looking.