New biggest star discovered, is not Justin Bieber
By Trent Wolbe 
posted July 22nd 2010 6:49AM
posted July 22nd 2010 6:49AM
You know how sometimes you're just sitting out in a field with your homies, looking up at the stars and thinking man, the universe is so BIG... and I'm just so small! Thanks to the Very Large Telescope in Chile, Professor Paul Crowther at Sheffield University, and some good old-fashioned Hubble data, you can feel just a little bit smaller. Crowther and his team have measured the giant known as R136a1 to be 265 times the size of the sun. That's a pretty cool size, but not quite as cool as the 320 solar masses it was at birth -- nothing to sneeze at, since previous discoveries had the largest stars somewhere around 150 solar masses. It's also the most luminous star ever found, at 10 million times brighter than the sun. Even so, don't get your hopes up trying to see this with your telescope (unless it's, you know, Very Large) because it's a good 165,000 light years away. Doesn't mean you can't look in its direction and smile, though. [Image: ESO / M. Kornmesser]
Stop doing that, all you are doing is making more people hear about him, we DONT NEED THAT!
@kostiak and I was like: "Baby, Baby, Baby, Oh!"
@kostiak I heard he died...
@kostiak
I don't get the joke. Who's that?
@Hmm
Beiber should challenge R136a1 to a dance off to settle the score
So sick of reading the name of that talentless man around the web, even with things not related to music, just an example of how BAD quality the music is these days. NO more REAL artists.
Very bad taste engadget.
@kostiak:
Justin Bieber is not a star no matter what. Now maybe if we were talking about biggest douche things would be different.
@Beatnik you said 'man'. I believe you meant 'boy'.
@wackyanimation R136a1 gets home field advantage.
game, set and match.
and, even if the bieb wins, she would have to make it all the way home, and she would be an old hag by then (like, over seventeen! ZOMG!)
@fpad77 Don't get my hopes up
@saspr you said 'man'. I believe you meant 'boy'.
I believe u mean 'girl'
@Beatnik "No more real musicians"
That is entirely opinion based. Me, I'm quite fond of Techno, Electronic, and Turntable music. I also enjoy musicians from all genres and from all generations. To say that there are no more musicians is equivalent to saying there are no more artists because they don't paint in the same style that Van Gogh did. It is ignorant, stubborn, and obstruction to the future.
*Looking at R136a1 and smiling*
Wait, which way is it again?
up
@Snappjay Ahh! Got it, thans!
* looking for some balloons in the basement *
'Biggest' is a bit ambiguous. Technically, it's the most massive. In terms of size, Canis Majoris still holds the record;
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VY_Canis_Majoris
@Barguast That;s what i was going to say as well. This star is largest by mass. Canis Majoris is largest by diameter, which IMO is more inpsiring then just mass.
@Barguast VY Canis Majoris has only 15-25x mass of the sun, previous record holder was Pistol Star (150x)
@garfieldfriends
Excellent point. No one seems to be clarifying that, not even on the scientists themselves on the news clips.
VY Canis Major is so big that 7 quadrillion earths could fit inside it, where as only a 1 million earths can fit inside the our Sun. Hard to comprehend.
@Barguast
you could only fit 60 vy canis majoris' between the earth and the sun (assuming my quick math is correct)
@Barguast
Yes. i also dont see how this is the larges star. on the wikipedia page it gives a bunch of pictures comparing stars, and in the picture showing canis majoris, the sun is less than a pixel large! (even an iphone pixel i believe ;) ) where as in the picture of the artical, you can see the sun compared to this star and it it much larger than a pixel.
Wow. On another note, excellent title :P
"unless it's, you know, Very Large"
I love you Engadget, I want your baby.
However, is there a way we can LAUNCH Bieber into this new Star?
Yes we just Give him an iPhone 5 and pray to god that this one can transform into a rocket...
@Professor Hubert J Farnsworth
No we give him an Evo. Because it fuzzing transforms into a jet and dots him there.
Also it fuzzing prints money so he can afford the fuel
@Professor Hubert J Farnsworth There's an app for that.
Well played.
Who is Justin Bieber? New engadget editor?
@4004
the chap in green
http://9gag.com/photo/29881_540.jpg
@4004
Girlfriend of the one who posted this news?
Warp factor 9.9999, "Engage!" Guess is time for Jean-Luc to go there xD.
Wasn't there a theory that said that a star couldn't have more than 150 times the mass of the Sun?
I love Justin Beiber, not because of her music, but because she is so young & fresh. I just want to eat her up omnomnomnom
Have astrophysicists successfully modified their theories that until recently placed a maximum limit on the mass of a proto-star? According to those theories, radiation pressure should have blown apart a star like R136a1 during formation.
@arcasinky That goes to show that scientist, while being smart, cannot make a theory about everything specially if they don't know it. If they were wrong about this sort of star existing and it's something that can be seen at this moment, how do they dare make an assumption as to how the world/universe was created? I'm not bringing evolution here or God, but the Big Bang? Just seems irreallistic. I don't know why they try and make assumptions and fool people when they don't even know or are hidding what they know.
@SskyNnet But the thing is, science had the amazing ability to encourage revisions. Nothing is ever really fact but it's all a bunch of theories. We can revise the big bang theory, revise the max mass star theory. It's an ongoing search for truth, not an assumption that what is and what was will forever be. It's the flexibity that I like and prefer.
Now, can we have your organs?
I bet Justin`s teachers are all over him...or wish they were !
Like in Saturday Night Live skit.
But... will it blend? Uhh star-smoke. Don't breathe that!
I loled at the title, but stop making fun lc him he's only a 14 year old girl
Bieber's not much of a star, just a white dwarf.
@rjgeek
And the Best Justin Beiber Joke award goes to... rjgeek!
*Loud cheers*
It may have been said already, but I don't have time to look. Anyway, to clarify, R136a1 is the mosy MASSIVE star found (as in mass), VY Canis Majoris is the largest in dimension. In case your aren't familiar with VY Canis Majoris, you would not believe how enormous it is (that's what she said). Read up on it, it is amazing.
@trekrema
"mosy"? I meant 'most'. Great, now my entire post is irrelevant.
It's inside our very own galaxy? Cool. Go Milky Way.
@agfrg
I think that's right. Its the Chandrasekhar limit, which states that a star can't be more than about a 150 solar masses, because past that, it inevitably collapses into a black hole.
@2401 Penitent Tangent
I believe the Eddington limit dictates this.
I believe your mom disproves it.
/joke