What is the difference between supergiants and giant stars?

What is the difference between supergiants and giant stars?

What is the difference between a giant star and a supergiant star? Giant stars have radii between 10 and 100 solar radii and luminosities between 10 and 1,000 times that of the Sun. Whereas Supergiants have radii between 30 and 1,000 solar radii and luminosities between 30,000 and 100,000 times that of the Sun.

Is there a white supergiant star?

A rare type of extremely bright supergiant with surface temperature of around 10,000°K. Deneb, one of the brightest stars in the Milky Way, is a white supergiant; it has luminosity approximately 60,000 times that of the Sun.

Why do stars become giants and supergiants?

The fusion of hydrogen to form helium changes the interior composition of a star, which in turn results in changes in its temperature, luminosity, and radius. Eventually, as stars age, they evolve away from the main sequence to become red giants or supergiants.

What is a white giant star?

A white dwarf is what stars like the Sun become after they have exhausted their nuclear fuel. Near the end of its nuclear burning stage, this type of star expels most of its outer material, creating a planetary nebula. Only the hot core of the star remains.

What are the characteristics of giants and supergiants?

Characteristics. Typically, giant stars have radii between 10 and 100 solar radii and luminosities between 10 and 1,000 times that of the Sun. Stars still more luminous than giants are referred to as supergiants and hypergiants. A hot, luminous main sequence star may also be referred to as a giant.

Why do white dwarf stars have low luminosity?

The stars of this group are known as White Dwarfs, and they have low luminosities because their radii are in general quite small, about the same as the Earth’s radius.

What are giants and supergiants?

A giant star is a star with substantially larger radius and luminosity than a main-sequence (or dwarf) star of the same surface temperature. Stars still more luminous than giants are referred to as supergiants and hypergiants.

Which stars become supergiants?

O type main-sequence stars and the most massive of the B type blue-white stars become supergiants. Due to their extreme masses, they have short lifespans, between 30 million years and a few hundred thousand years.

Why do supergiants have high luminosity?

Supergiant stars that are old enough to be fusing helium instead of hydrogen. This process releases more energy, causing the star’s outer layers to swell.

What is a giant supergiant?

Supergiants are the most massive stars. Supergiants can have masses from 10 to 70 solar masses and brightness from 30,000 up to hundreds of thousands times the solar luminosity. They vary greatly in radii, usually from 30 to 500, or even in excess of 1000 solar radii.

What is the difference between supergiants and white dwarfs?

Supergiants are high mass stars near the end of their life. They are very small and dense, formed when a main sequence star reaches the end of its life. White dwarf stars gradually cool over time until they no longer emit light. The smallest, dimmest, and coolest stars are brown dwarfs.

How do the characteristics of the giant stars and supergiant stars compare?

Subclasses of giants are supergiants, with even larger radii and brightness for their masses and temperatures (see supergiant star); red giants, which have low temperatures but are of great brightness; and subgiants, which have slightly reduced radii and brightness. Thus, they are low-density “diffuse” stars.