Betelgeuse is a so-called red supergiant, about 1,000 times larger than the Sun and the tenth brightest star in the night sky where it sits on Orion’s right shoulder.
At the beginning of the week, the giant star is expected to be eclipsed by an asteroid called Leona, reports the news agency AP.
Leona is in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter, and scientists recently estimated it to be as much as 55 kilometers wide and 80 kilometers long, although uncertainties remain.
The eclipse is only expected to last 10-15 seconds, and it is uncertain whether the asteroid will obscure the entire star. Possibly there will be an annular eclipse with a bright edge visible all around.
“That an asteroid blocks the light from such a strong star is quite unusual,” he says Markus Janson, who is professor of astrophysics at Stockholm University.
The phenomenon is expected to occur late on Monday and early on Tuesday. But there is no point in going out into the Swedish night to see the phenomenon, according to Janson.
— No, we are quite far away.
The eclipse of Betelgeuse is expected to be visible from parts of Central Asia, Southern Europe, the United States and Mexico, among others.
According to Markus Janson, the eclipse is a good opportunity for astronomers to learn more about the large asteroid Leona.
— The star becomes like a searchlight behind the asteroid that helps to gain more knowledge about asteroids. It can, for example, provide clues about how the solar system was formed, says Markus Janson.