What happens when small stars run out of fuel? - ProProfs Discuss
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What happens when small stars run out of fuel?

What happens when small stars run out of fuel?

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Asked by J. Pollock, Last updated: Dec 20, 2024

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John F. connor

John F. connor

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John F. connor
John F. connor, Content Marketing executive, MA, Minsk,Poland

Answered Feb 08, 2019

A star, like our sun, burns hydrogen into helium. It later burns even heavier elements, and the star’s end comes, expelling its outer layers and has its inner core either contract or collapse down depending on what type of star it is. When stars extinguish, they collapse quickly under their own weight. Some stars that are large enough end their lives by exploding in a supernova.

Throughout their lives, stars are fighting against the crushing force of their own gravity. Inside, nuclear reactions fuse together smaller elements, like hydrogen, to create bigger ones and release energy. Stars must burn through fuel and release energy to prevent them from collapsing upon themselves, but this cannot go on forever.

Soon, the star will run out of its essential fuel entirely, resulting in an explosion. A star’s compression, which is many times larger than our Sun, can be so much that a rebounding shockwave is created. This can cause a final expansion that releases the layers of a star in a supernova.

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G. Roland

G. Roland

G. Roland
G. Roland, Professor, Austin

Answered Dec 03, 2018

The life of a star is always hard. It makes sure that it will fight against its own gravity until such time when it dies. The star runs on its own fuel. It will continue using up its own fuel until there is no fuel available anymore. When this happens, this might cause the star to explode.

The moment that it runs out of its own energy, it will explode and that will be the end of the star. There are times when a black hole is in the place of where the star used to be. This black hole can become bigger until it consumes another star which can also cause it to explode.

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