what is the brightest known star?
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The brightest known star is R136a1 is a blue hypergiant star and the most massive star known. It is an estimated 265 solar masses and 8,700,000 times the luminosity of the Sun.
Other luminous stars in our galaxy:
- Cygnus OB2-12 (bolometric luminosity 6,300,000)
- HD 93129A (bolometric luminosity 5,500,000)
- Eta Carinae (bolometric luminosity 5,000,000)
- LBV 1806-20 (bolometric luminosity 5,000,000)
- QPM-241 (bolometric luminosity 4,500,000)
- Pismis 24-1 (bolometric luminosity 4,200,000)
- WR 101e (bolometric luminosity 3,700,000)
- WR 102ka (bolometric luminosity 3,700,000)
- HD 5980 (bolometric luminosity 3,400,000)
- LSS 4067 (bolometric luminosity 3,000,000)
- HD 93250 (bolometric luminosity 2,800,000)
- Cyg OB2 -8A (bolometric luminosity 2,750,000)
- Var 83 (bolometric luminosity 2,240,000)
- HDE 269810 (bolometric luminosity 2,220,000)
- Wray 17-96 (bolometric luminosity 1,800,000)
- The Pistol Star (bolometric luminosity 1,700,000)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_mos…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R136a1
Other luminous stars in our galaxy:
- Cygnus OB2-12 (bolometric luminosity 6,300,000)
- HD 93129A (bolometric luminosity 5,500,000)
- Eta Carinae (bolometric luminosity 5,000,000)
- LBV 1806-20 (bolometric luminosity 5,000,000)
- QPM-241 (bolometric luminosity 4,500,000)
- Pismis 24-1 (bolometric luminosity 4,200,000)
- WR 101e (bolometric luminosity 3,700,000)
- WR 102ka (bolometric luminosity 3,700,000)
- HD 5980 (bolometric luminosity 3,400,000)
- LSS 4067 (bolometric luminosity 3,000,000)
- HD 93250 (bolometric luminosity 2,800,000)
- Cyg OB2 -8A (bolometric luminosity 2,750,000)
- Var 83 (bolometric luminosity 2,240,000)
- HDE 269810 (bolometric luminosity 2,220,000)
- Wray 17-96 (bolometric luminosity 1,800,000)
- The Pistol Star (bolometric luminosity 1,700,000)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_mos…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R136a1
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Sirius is not the brightest-looking star.
The Sun is the brightest-looking star.
Absolute brightness and how bright a star looks from Earth are two different things. The first poster listed the known stars with the most absolute brightness. Fortunately for us they are all far away so when they explode they will emit a lot of radiation but it won't be so bad here on Earth.
Another interesting thing about brightness of stars is that some of them emit most of their light in wavelengths that we don't see. An example is Saiph, the star in the bottom left of the Orion rectangle. It produces as much light as Rigel in the other bottom corner but Saiph emits mostly ultraviolet light.
The Sun is the brightest-looking star.
Absolute brightness and how bright a star looks from Earth are two different things. The first poster listed the known stars with the most absolute brightness. Fortunately for us they are all far away so when they explode they will emit a lot of radiation but it won't be so bad here on Earth.
Another interesting thing about brightness of stars is that some of them emit most of their light in wavelengths that we don't see. An example is Saiph, the star in the bottom left of the Orion rectangle. It produces as much light as Rigel in the other bottom corner but Saiph emits mostly ultraviolet light.
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The brightest star visible to the naked eye is Sirius, the dog star, in the constellation Canis Major. In August, it appears in the daytime sky with the Sun. It is this fact that folks have coined the phrase "THE DOG DAYS OF AUGUST" because the 2 brightest stars in the sky (Sirius & the Sun) together together make the Northern Hemisphere's August days hot & unbearable. That's just folklore though, but that's how that phrase came to be.