Talk:List of most massive stars

Re-name

Anyone mind if I move this from List of heaviest stars to List of the most massive stars? Weight and mass have different meanings in space! AndrewRT - Talk 21:19, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

Pismis 24-1 in the news

Galaxy's heavyweight champ loses its crown AFP. ^BlankVerse 06:28, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Umpteen loads more stars

Well, after added a few more stars to the list, I have now come across the following table [1] from the following site [2], which lists a good 100 more ! I'll let someone else add these :) For those interested, the following pdfs may also be of use, as they also list massive some stars amongst the discussions ...

• http://www.stsci.de/fg/pdf/crowther2007.pdf
• http://www.astroscu.unam.mx/massive_stars/news/news83.pdf
• http://www.chara.gsu.edu/~wiita/UML_Stars_obs.pdf
• http://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0610356v2
• http://arxiv.org/abs/0802.1742v1

The Yeti (talk) 22:39, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

HD 93129 A

Listed in the table as 120 solar masses, this has recently been shown to be a pair of stars making HD 93129 a triple system rather than a binary, so HD 93129 A would have a smaller mass. http://www.arcetri.astro.it/iaus227/posters/maizapellaniz_j.pdf . HD 93129 is missing from the English wikipedia but exists in http://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/HD_93129 Mollwollfumble (talk) 01:10, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Pistol Star

I notice that, although due to mangled markup it's not visible in the article, the table assigns a mass of 200 solar masses to the Pistol Star. According to http://www.solstation.com/x-objects/pistol.htm, this is a possible initial mass for the star rather than its estimated current mass. How should this be indicated in the table? Should it be indicated in the table? Should only current masses be listed in the table? Osteoderm_Jacket (talk) 20:33, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

Eddington limit

>>Studying the Arches cluster, ... do not occur any larger than about 150 solar masses.

The Eddington limit is given as 120 solar masses and this paragraph in the article seems to assume that it's "150 solar masses"? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.174.108.42 (talk) 14:05, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

The Eddington limit seems to be incorrect if there are some starts with more than 250 solar masses, like R136a1... so is there are error on this star's mass? Is the Eddington limit theory incorrect?

Recent research gives a result that stars with masses greater than the Eddington limit are create through the merger of massive stars. -- 76.65.128.252 (talk) 12:11, 24 August 2012 (UTC)

There's no single answer. This isn't the SATs and it isn't multiple choice with one right and three wrong choices. First, the Eddington limit is a limit on the luminosity of a star with a particular mass. To define a mass limit you have to relate the mass to the luminosity which is by no means exact even for main sequence stars. Then, the "limit" is not fixed and not hard. It varies with the composition and rotation of the star, and even at the limit for a particular star, it doesn't suddenly cease to exist. Stars approaching the limit show increasing mass loss, instability, and irregular pulsations, and beyond that invisible line they continue to exist but with dramatic mass loss which limits their lives greatly. So stars around or beyond this limit are rare, but also they are easy to find even at great distance.

As a baseline the expected onset of extreme mass loss from continuum-driven winds for zero-age main sequence stars in the solar neighbourhood is thought to be around 150 solar masses (but comfortably anything from a little over a hundred to around 200), higher for stars lacking heavy elements, lower for stars rotating quickly, and lower for evolved stars as they lose mass but become more luminous. This limit is both theoretical and empirical, calculated and observed. Stars significantly beyond the limit are predicted in the early universe but only in very unusual situations close enough to be observed. Discoveries of stars much beyond the limit have consistently been shown to be multiple systems or simply over-estimated. Theories continue to be developed on how more massive stars might be seen in the local universe, mergers between old low-metallicity stars, mergers of young moderately massive stars, simply observing a single abnormally large star in a brief window before it destroys itself, or modifications to the structure models themselves. Lithopsian (talk) 19:04, 24 August 2012 (UTC)

Length of list

Perhaps we should trim the list to not bother listing stars smaller than (say) 100 solar masses? There's no point in having the smaller stars on the list. Tarl.Neustaedter (talk) 05:36, 12 April 2015 (UTC)

Probably. The list is pretty much complete (with known data) to lower than 100 M_☉ though. Maybe near 50 M_☉. Below that we just have a random sample of supergiants. Lithopsian (talk) 10:06, 12 April 2015 (UTC)

This article is messed up

@Lithopsian @SkyFlubbler Ok. This article says that the legend is; red for hypergiant (yet most of the hot stars there are hypergiants and are definitely not red); Dark blue is for Wolf-Rayet (That's fine); Light blue is for O (yet some stars that are luminous blue variables (I'll get to that later) are listed as O-type stars and then are sometimes listed as luminous blue variables); Lighter blue is for B (Most luminous blue variables have a B-type spectrum so the article uses B-type sometimes and LBV-type sometimes which isn't good. Plus, the article lists 6 Cassiopeiae as a B-type star and not as a A-type star, which it actually is); White is for luminous blue variable (Now this has a large problem. Most LBVs aren't white, but when they are, the article uses the LBV color (white). When they aren't, the article puts them as something else.(B,O etc.)

Someone should do something about this error. Any ideas? hi (talk) 16:11, 2 May 2015 (UTC)

Placement of Eta Carinae A

I would like to point out that the mass values for Eta Carinae A are ~100-200 M_☉. However, it is placed among relatively lower mass stars such as WR 102ka (Peony Nebula Star). The upper mass value of the star should not be disregarded because a new article has been found showing a lower mass. It only provides more uncertainty, and a larger range for possible mass values of the star. It should be placed higher on the list with these given values. Also, I would like to add that the mass of Eta Carinae A can strongly be constrained to >90 M_☉ due to its high luminosity.

Thanks. 174.110.102.238 17:03, 25 March 2016 (UTC)

The stars are generally sorted by the lower range of their mass; there are some obvious failures to do so in the list due to the haphazard nature of changes on this list, but the general principle mostly applies. Given that Eta Carinae A is somewhere between 100 to 200 solar masses, it seems to be placed at the correct place. Tarl.Neustaedter (talk) 20:14, 25 March 2016 (UTC)

Where's Pismis 24-1?

Not by any stretch of the imagination the most massive star now, but since it was once thought to be and because it crops up from time to time on various blogs and APOD, it would be far more relevant to the other notable stars section than the other Pismis 24 entries. Lithopsian (talk) 11:08, 28 March 2016 (UTC)

Ask for naked-eye and well-known stars

I want to know the mass of some of the naked-eye stars especially the brightest stars for the purpose of comparison. Julliene mae (talk) 02:31, 3 June 2016 (UTC)

Because some of the members of list of brightest stars are notable massive but it doesn't include in this list. Julliene mae (talk) 12:18, 28 June 2016 (UTC)

I can request for the common name for ζ Ori, ε Ori, and ζ Puppis as Alnitak, Alnilam and Naos. Also for γ Vel A as Regor.Julliene mae (talk) 14:33, 13 July 2016 (UTC)

Examples list

We should trim back the list of "example" non-massive stars; the list is supposed to be of the most massive stars, with "a few" example stars of lower mass. I'm guessing that trimming that list down to maybe a dozen of the more well known stars might do it. Any objections? Tarl N. (discuss) 18:17, 22 July 2016 (UTC)

I've trimmed it more than once, but they keep creeping back. Everyone thinks their favourite stars should be in the list, massive or not. Lithopsian (talk) 20:55, 22 July 2016 (UTC)

How about numbering the list, and instead of "A few additional examples with masses lower ..." say "Twenty examples with masses lower ..." (or some limit), so editors will be more reluctant to add, and other editors will be more likely to truncate?   ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf)  22:03, 22 July 2016 (UTC)

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Paper

New paper: https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/0004-637X/697/1/701/pdf - table 4 shows lots of clusters. I've seen one of the refs, that alone gives lots of stars. Someone want to add them?PNSMurthy (talk) 04:02, 29 July 2020 (UTC)

References

587 Solar Mass star???

This paper has a value of 587 Msol for the star HD 269333, https://arxiv.org/pdf/1401.5474.pdf. What is up with this value? Why is it impossibly high? Nussun05 (talk) 18:33, 14 April 2021 (UTC)

Probable binary. The mass is calculated naively from the luminosity. If the observed luminosity is boosted by an OB companion, then the calculated mass will go off the chart. Lithopsian (talk) 18:53, 14 April 2021 (UTC)

Westerhout 49-2 and BAT99-98

Are their mass estimates reliable? If they're larger in both mass and radius than R136a1, then why are they less luminous? --Carnifex33 (talk) 01:29, 23 February 2022 (UTC)

Distance

Do we really need the distance section? Atlantlc27Lol (talk) 02:24, 10 January 2024 (UTC)

Yes, I think we do need to keep the distance measures (in light-years, NOT parsecs [Death to parsecs!]): It's something that the casually interested public always wants to know at star parties / sidewalk astronomy, and the lead-in text makes the specific point that all of these stars are too far away to be seen easily, and its part of why the measurements are dodgy. So checking the distances gives yet another way to gauge the reliability of a particular star's mass estimate (also mentioned in the intro).

Distance to an object is also something that schoolchildren (5th graders in semi-rural California) ask about as soon as I gave them the spooky news about η Carinae's impending big blow-up. They seem more excited about the possibilities of the Earth being destroyed than taking in the fact that it is vastly too far away to do anything (other than making yet another a great light-show). If little kids are thinking about it and excited and interested, then I say that big adults are also going to be thinking about it but hanging back with their questions. Better to keep the distance part in.
12.75.128.20 (talk) 08:36, 5 April 2024 (UTC)

Title has small inaccuracy

The title is List of most massive stars. But these are stars discovered, so I suggest the writer does rename it to List of most massive known stars. Cosmicwolfanimations (talk) 03:56, 24 March 2024 (UTC)

Sticky header annoys me – am I the only one?

Someone added a "sticky header" template to the main list (heaviest-stars, vs. nearby semi-heavies). I find it annoying. I think it wouldn't be that bad if it was only a single-line header, but haven't been able to compress the heading enough to do that. Am I the only one who finds it a nuissance? Any reactions to taking it out? (I will admit that a sticky column heading can be nice, but I think that this one is not nice.)
12.75.128.20 (talk) 08:47, 5 April 2024 (UTC)