What happens if a star has too much mass?

If the star is large enough, it can go through a series of less-efficient nuclear reactions to produce internal heat. However, eventually these reactions will no longer generate sufficient heat to support the star agains its own gravity and the star will collapse.

What causes a high mass star to change?

Despite the dramatic events in the interior, the high-mass stars’s outer appearance changes slowly. Each time core fusion ceases, shell burning intensifies, further inflating the outer layers. Each time the core flares up, the star contracts slightly, but the luminosity stays about the same.

What is a high mass star remnant called?

Supernova Remnants (SNRs)

What is the correct evolution for a high mass star?

From Red Giant to Supernova: The Evolutionary Path of High Mass Stars. Once stars that are 5 times or more massive than our Sun reach the red giant phase, their core temperature increases as carbon atoms are formed from the fusion of helium atoms.

What is the difference between low mass and high mass stars?

Low mass stars end their lives here, by expelling their outer layers due to thermal pulses in a planetary nebula phase, but high mass stars have so much mass that they can survive this phase. In our earlier analogy of a pressure cooker, high-mass stars have a heavy “lid,” so they keep on cooking.

Can a high mass star become a black hole?

In general, stars with final masses in the range 2 to 3 solar masses are believed to ultimately collapse to a black hole.

Why do high and low-mass stars evolve differently?

Why does a high-mass star evolve differently from a low-mass star? It can fuse additional elements because its core can get hotter. protostar, main sequence, red giant, white dwarf. objects massive enough to fuse deuterium but not massive enough to sustain hydrogen fusion.

What are two characteristics of high mass stars?

High-mass stars are very luminous and short lived. They forge heavy elements in their cores, explode as supernovas, and expel these elements into space. Apart from hydrogen and helium, most of the elements in the universe, including those comprising Earth and everything on it, came from these stars.

What comes after a protostar?

For our Sun, and stars of the same mass, the protostar phase would have ended after approximately 100,000 years. After this, the protostar stops growing and the disk of material surrounding it is destroyed by radiation. If the protostar was unsuccessful in acquiring enough mass, a brown dwarf will come into shape.

What are all the stages of a high mass star?

Seven Main Stages of a Star

  • Giant Gas Cloud. A star originates from a large cloud of gas.
  • Protostar. When the gas particles in the molecular cloud run into each other, heat energy is produced.
  • T-Tauri Phase.
  • Main Sequence.
  • Red Giant.
  • The Fusion of Heavier Elements.
  • Supernovae and Planetary Nebulae.

What is a high mass protostar?

A high mass protostar is the second stage of this star. A high mass protostar looks like a star but isn’t hot enough to become a star yet. On Earth high mass protostars would be considered a vacuum. They are hard to see because their light is blocked by dust surrounding it.