(19.
2) The life cycle of stars
Since the core of stars with low mass is cooler than that of much more
massive stars, they remain on their main sequency for much longer.
However, eventually, they run low on hydrogen fuel in their core. At this
stage, they begin to move off the main sequency into the next phase of their
lives.
Solar mass is the mass of the Sun, about 1.99 x10^30
Stars between 0.5 solar mass and 10 solar mass will evolve into red giants
after their main sequency. At the start of the red giant phase, the reduction
in energy released by fusion in the core means that the gravitational force is
now greater than the reduced force from radiation and gas pressure. The
core of the star therefore begins to collapse. As the core shrinks, the
pressure increases enough to start fusion in a shell around the core.
Red giant stars have inert cored. Fusion no longer takes place, since very
little hydrogen remains, and the temperature is not high enough for the
helium nuclei to overcome the electrostatic repulsions between them.
However, fusion of hydrogen into helium continues in the shell around the
core. This causes the periphery of the star to expand as layers slowly move
away from the core. As these layers expand, they cool, giving the star its
characteristic red color.
Eventually most layers of the red giant around the core drift off into space as
a planetary nebula, leaving begins the hot core as a white dwarf. The white
dwarf is very dense, often with a mass around that of our Sun, but with the
volume of the Earth. No fusion reactions take place inside a white dwarf. It
emits energy only because it leaks photons created in its earlier evolution.
The surface temperature of a white dwarf can be as much as 30000K.
According to an important rule of quantum physics, the Pauli exclusion
principle, two electrons cannot exist in the same energy state. When the
core of a star begins to collapse under the force of gravity, the electrons are
squeezed together, and these create a pressure that prevents the core from
further gravitational collapse. This pressure created by the electrons is
known as the electro degeneracy pressure.
But there is a limit. The electron degeneracy pressure is only sufficient to
prevent gravitational collapse if the core has a mass less than 1.44 solar
mass. This is called the Chandrasekhar limit. This limit is the maximum mass
of a stable white dwarf star. If the core is more massive than this the star’s
life takes a more dramatic turn.
Stars with a mass greater than 10 solar mass live very different lives. Since
their mass is much greater, their cores are much hotter. They consume the
hydrogn in their core in much less time, some in only a few million years.
As with stars with smaller masses, when the hydrogen in the core runes low,
the core begins to collapse under gravitational forces. However, as the cores
of these more massive stars are much hotter, the helium nuclei formed from
the fusion of hydrogen nuclei are moving fast enough to overcome
electrostatic repulsion, so fusion of helium nuclei into heavier elements
occurs.
The changes in the core cause the star to expand, forming a red supergiant
(sometimes called super red giant). Inside, the temperature and pressure are
high enough to fuse even massive nuclei together, forming a series of shells
inside the star.
This process continues until the star develops an iron core. Iron nuclei cannot
fuse, because such a reaction cannot produce any energy. This makes the
star very unstable and leads to the death of the star in a catastrophic
implosion of the layers that bounce off the solid core, leading to a shockwave
that ejects all the core material in space. This explosion is called a type II
supernova.
For more massive stars, at a critical point (depending on the mass of the
star) the nuclear fusion taking place in the core suddenly becomes unable to
withstand the crushing gravitational forces. The star collapses in on itself,
leading to a supernova. Afterwards, the remnant core is compressed into one
of two objects:
Neutron star: If the mass of the core is greater than Chandrasekhar
limit, the gravitational collapse continues, forming a neutron star.
These strange stars are almost entirely made up of neutrons and can
be very small. They have a typical mass of 2 solar masses.
Black hole: If the core has a mass greater than about 3 solar mases,
the gravitational collapse continues to compress the core. The result is
a gravitational field so strong that to escape it an object would need an
escape velocity greater than the speed of light. Nothing, not even
photons, can escape a black hole. Black holes vary in mass. Super
massive black holes with masses of several million solar masses are
thought to be at the center of most galaxies.
Supernovae are rare. But they are so luminius that we can see them in even
the most distant galaxies. Their output power is so great that sometimes
they are brighter than the rest of their galaxy, radiating more energy in a
few thousandths of a second than our Sun will in its entire lifetime.
Supernovae create all the heavy elements. Everything above iron was
created in a super nova. And such events help distribute the heavier
elements throughout the universe.
