Astronomers Find Stars That Appear Older Than The Universe

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Matt Wilson's picture
Astronomers Find Stars That Appear Older Than The Universe

The age of the universe is 13.8 billion years. But one star has an age of 14.46 billion years.

I'm not an expert in this area, but why isn't anybody troubled that this old star is only 190 light years away?

'But the most confusing star of all is HD 140283, informally nicknamed the Methuselah star. At just 190 light years away, we can measure its luminosity, surface temperature, and composition very precisely; we can also see that it's just beginning to evolve into the subgiant phase and towards becoming a red giant. These pieces of information, combined, allow us to get a well-constrained value for the star's age, and the result is disturbing, to say the least: 14.46 billion years. Yet some of the other properties it displays, like an iron content of 0.4% the Sun's, suggest that it's very old, but not quite among the very oldest stars of all. Although there is an uncertainty on the age of around 800 million years, that still places it uncomfortably early, and hints at a potential conflict between how old the stars are and how old the Universe is.'

- https://is.gd/1UrlbE

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Nyarlathotep's picture
Matt-4 - ...allow us to get a
xenoview's picture
No conflict at all. If
MCDennis's picture
science is so cool
MCDennis's picture
Mystery solved according to
LucyAustralopithecus's picture
it has a triagnomic parallax
curious's picture
This remind me of 2015
Sky Pilot's picture
Why does anyone think that
LucyAustralopithecus's picture
This is the universe what we
Sky Pilot's picture
LucyAustralopithecus,
ZeffD's picture
Quote: The stars themselves
LucyAustralopithecus's picture
False - Yes you can, and you
Randomhero1982's picture
Lucy - what do you mean by in
LucyAustralopithecus's picture
no, of the star as it burns
Randomhero1982's picture
That's alright, I thought you
Randomhero1982's picture
Any ideas on the youngest
LucyAustralopithecus's picture
No not for that.
rtmcdge's picture
I don't know much about
Nyarlathotep's picture
Gerald - So either stars are
LucyAustralopithecus's picture
Yes, Also the universe too

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