Earth's tragedy when the Sun swells up to 100 times

New research by Belgian scientists shows that when the Sun swells 100 times, swallowing Mercury and Venus, life on Earth will become ashes.

The research team in Leuven, Belgium, could predict the future of the solar system based on its neighboring star, 208 light-years from Earth, with a dying planet, according to the International Business Times.

In a discovery published yesterday in the journal Astronomy and Astrophysics, astronomers use an 16km ALMA radio telescope, combining 66 individual radio antennas, to observe L2 Puppis star. 5 billion years ago, this star is very much like the Sun today. However, it is now a giant red star about to die at the end of the evolutionary cycle.

Life on Earth will be destroyed by the Sun after 5 billion years.(Photo: Science Photo Libarary).

"After another 5 billion years, the Sun will develop into a giant red star, 100 times larger than its current size. It will also experience tremendous mass loss under the influence of stellar winds. The end result of the evolutionary process after 7 billion years is a small white dwarf that is about the size of the Earth but much heavier , " said Professor Leen Decin of KU Leuven Institute of Astronomy.

According to Ward Homan, a graduate student in astrophysics, L2 Puppis is about 10 billion years old. " 5 billion years ago, the star is the nearly perfect twin version of the Sun today with the same mass. This third mass is lost during the star's evolution. The same will be Homan said it happened to the Sun in the distant future .

Although the Sun's transformation changes the whole system, scientists are uncertain about the fate of the Earth."We know the Sun will become bigger and brighter, so it will probably destroy all life forms on our planet. But it is still possible that Earth's rock core survives the period. Giant red stars and continue to turn around white dwarfs , " said Professor Decin.

The researchers discovered an object around, how L2 Puppis is 300 million kilometers, twice the distance between the Earth and the Sun. Most likely this planet will help herald the future of the Earth. Further research on L2 Puppis and its planet will shed light on the last evolution of the Sun and planets in the system.