Description
We have developed a website containing a 3D model made on Blender, and some fun facts for people to familiarize themselves with star variability and different factors that affect how we perceive celestial objects from our planet. The project emerged from the notion of when NASA scientists noticed via the Hubble telescope that the star “Betelgeuse” was dying, to then discover it wasn't; in fact, it turned out to be just a nebula, a cloud of dust, passing by. The main purpose of the website is to show users a fun way to visualize the diminution of the brightness of stars and why sometimes we believe we see them fading out.
Betelgeuse
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Betelgeuse, is a red supergiant star located in Orion constellation. This celestial object abruptly dimmed in late 2019 and early 2020, due to a giant cloud of dust positioned between the star and us.
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Based on the observations of the Hubble Telescope, the reason for Betelgeuse attenuation is most likely due to an immense amount of hot material that was formed when the superhot plasma broke away from a large convection cell on the star's surface. This material went through the hot atmosphere to the colder exterior layer, where it cooled and formed dust grains. This resulted in a cloud of dust that blocked a big part of Betelgeuse light.