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Space

One star being eaten by another will take revenge as a black hole

Astronomers have found one huge star eating another, but the smaller star is predicted to eventually become a black hole and go on to feed off its companion

27 April 2023

The smaller, brighter, hotter star (left) is losing mass to its bigger companion (right)
UCL / J. daSilva

A distant star is being eaten by its companion, but it is getting ready to take its revenge. The pair make up the most massive contact binary – two stars that are so close together they are technically touching – ever found.

The pair of stars is called SSN 7, and it is located in a star-forming region called NGC 346 in the Small Magellanic Cloud, a galaxy about 200,000 light years away. Matthew Rickard at University …

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