Now we know, That’s the way Big stars born

A new discovery has the potential to answer the long-standing question of how massive stars are born -- and hints at the possibility that planets could form around the galaxy's biggest bodies.
"Astronomers have long been unclear about how the most massive stars form," said Stefan Kraus, a NASA Sagan Exoplanet Fellow and astronomer at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. "Because they tend to be at very large distances and surrounded by dusty envelopes, it's very hard to separate and closely observe them."
To get a better look, Kraus' team used the Very Large Telescope Interferometer of the European Southern Observatory in Chile to focus on IRAS 13481-6124, a star located at a distance of 10,000 light-years away in the constellation Centaurus, and about 20 times more massive than our sun. "We were able to get a very sharp view into the innermost regions around this star by combining the light of separate telescopes," Kraus said, "basically mimicking the resolving power of a telescope with an incredible 85-meter [280-foot] mirror."
The team's observations yielded a jackpot result: the discovery of a massive disk of dust and gas encircling the giant young star. "It's the first time something like this has been observed," Kraus said. "The disk very much resembles what we see around young stars that are much smaller, except everything is scaled up and more massive."
The presence of the disk is strong evidence that even the very largest stars in the galaxy form by the same process as smaller ones -- growing out of the dense accumulation of vast quantities of gas and dust, rather than the merging of smaller stars, as had been previously suggested by some scientists. The results were confirmed by NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope. "We looked at archival images of the star taken by Spitzer, and confirmed that the star is flinging disk material outward from its polar regions, just as we see with smaller stars and their dust disks," Kraus said.
The discovery also opens up the possibility that planets, perhaps even Earth-like ones, may be able to form around massive stars like IRAS 13481-6124, in the same way that they formed around our sun when it was much younger. "In the future, we might be able to see gaps in this and other dust disks created by orbiting planets, although it is unlikely that such bodies could survive for long." Kraus said. "A planet around such a massive star would be destroyed by the strong stellar winds and intense radiation as soon as the protective disk material is gone, which leaves little chance for the development of solar systems like our own."

The daylight star - Tycho's Supernova

Tycho's Supernova, the red circle visible in the upper left part of the image, is SN 1572 is a remnant of a star explosion is named after the astronomer Tycho Brahe, although he was not the only person to observe and record the supernova. When the supernova first appeared in November 1572, it was as bright as Venus and could be seen in the daytime. Over the next two years, the supernova dimmed until it could no longer be seen with the naked eye. In the 1950s, the remnants of the supernova could be seen again with the help of telescopes.When the star exploded, it sent out a blast wave into the surrounding material, scooping up interstellar dust and gas as it went, like a snow plow. An expanding shock wave traveled into the surroundings and a reverse shock was driven back in toward the remnants of the star. Previous observations by NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope indicate that the nature of the light that WISE sees from the supernova remnant is emission from dust heated by the shock wave.To the right is a star-forming nebula of dust and gas, called S175. This cloud of material is about 3,500 light-years away and 35 light-years across. It is heated by radiation from the young, hot stars within it, and the dust within the cloud radiates infrared light.

Planets parade on 14th July

Five of the sky's brightest and most dazzling lights will make appearances in the western sky on several nights this month in a promising celestial show for skywatchers with clear skies.
Venus, the dazzling evening star, is currently creeping past Regulus, the brightest star of Leo, the lion. At the beginning of July, Venus was well to the lower right of Regulus, but now the planet stands side by side with the bright star.
Being the brightest object in the night sky other than the moon, Venus is impossible to miss. People often mistake it for an airplane or UFO, and calls to local police and sheriff departments are not uncommon when Venus graces the evening sky.
The slim crescent moon will dance close to this bright duo on July 14, making an equilateral triangle with the moon at left, Venus on top, and Regulus on the right.
The orange-hued planet Mars and the golden gas giant Saturn will be a little higher to the group's upper left.
The display of these five bright cosmic objects provides a good look at the ecliptic – the path that the sun traces across the sky.
In ancient times, the ecliptic was thought to hold special significance. In fact, the first major constellations ever drawn were those of the zodiac – the 12 constellations that lie along the ecliptic.