Proxima Centauri’s Huge Solar Flare can destroy Alien Life, the star closest to our Sun, is a red dwarf star, like most of the stars in the galaxy. But a huge solar flare has been discovered recently emitting from it. This is a dangerous phenomenon, and researchers claim that if aliens live on planets near that star, they are having a bad time now.
Proxima Centauri’s Huge Solar Flare can destroy Alien Life
A solar flare, sometimes called a stellar flare, is a phenomenon where a star emits excessive energy all of a sudden due to the magnetic fields of the star’s body. The magnetic field reacts with the electrically charged gas and sends out huge amounts of energy in a matter of seconds. Proxima Centauri has emitted a huge stellar flare. The energy was within the ultraviolet wavelength, so only UV-sensitive devices and telescopes caught the effect.
Stellar flares are not uncommon. Our Sun emits stellar flares too. But this flare is one of the biggest flares discovered in the galaxy. The Proxima Centauri flare was almost a hundred times powerful than the Sun’s, causing the star to glow almost 1400 times brighter in the UV range. This happened within a few seconds.
How Does It Affect Life?
Stellar flares are dangerous for living beings. They are mostly harmful ultraviolet radiation, so species like humans or any life forms living on Earth will have a devastating effect of such a huge flare. With such flares frequently emitting out from the star, there cannot be any atmosphere in the planets orbiting Proxima Centauri. However, researchers d not rule out the possibility of life forms on those planets. They just think the alien life and living will be considerably different from ours.
It needs to be mentioned that such solar flares are not at all uncommon. Red dwarfs emit such flares often, and sometimes, several times a day. Researchers are now eyeing other stellar flares and compare them with the Proxima Centauri. Also, this gives them a new idea for investigating alien life forms. The study was published in The Astrophysical Journal Letters.
Proxima Centauri
The star in discussion is the nearest star to our Sun. It is located at a distance of 4.25 light-years from Earth. The star is eight times smaller than the Sun and is a red dwarf. Red dwarfs are known to be long-surviving and cooler than the blue super-giants. The sun has a lot of planets moving around it, including the Proxima Centauri b, which has similarities with Earth. However, the stellar flares discovered recently have changed the views of the researchers regarding the expectation of life forms there.
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