Stars Webquest

Stellar Evolution

The pictures below combine to make one possible sequence for the evolution of a star. Use this sequence to answer the second part of Process ii.

Slide 1 - Stellar Nursery. Dust and gasses from exploding stars collects in a Stellar nursery. Here tiny fragments join together, slowly becoming bigger and bigger until new stars are formed. Takes about 1 million years.

As the star reaches old age and it runs out of fuel, it finally collapse in on itself and then explodes sending dust and gasses out in to the universe.

Protostars. Very young stars surrounded by layers or rings of dust. This dust forms planets, falls in to the star to be used as fuel or get blown away to form new stellar nurseries. This stage takes about 50 million years.

Neutron Star. This is the remains of a massive star after it supernovas. The last reminant of a dying star, it gives off radiation and is often refered to as a pulsar.

Blue giants are young stars with lots of energy as they consume hydrogen and helium as their fuel source.

Red Giants. As stars reach maturity, consumption of hydrogen is complete and the star expands and cools. It takes about 10 billion years to get here.

Blue Super Giant. As the red giant expands in can eject a vast quantity of material, turning it in to a blue super giant.

Super Shell. The combined activity of stellar winds and supernovas create vast clouds of dead star dust in space. These eventually will collapse and form brand new stella nurseries.