Star
A star is a massive, self-luminous sphere of plasma held together by its own gravity. It shines by converting hydrogen into helium through nuclear fusion in its core, releasing energy across the electromagnetic spectrum.
Stars form in large clouds of gas and dust—called nebulae—where regions collapse under gravity, creating protostars. When core temperatures reach millions of degrees, fusion ignites, marking the birth of a star. Observatories like Hubble and missions such as NASA’s Infrared telescopes have imaged this process in action.
The majority (~90%) of stars are main-sequence stars, fusing hydrogen into helium. These include a broad range of masses—from red dwarfs (small, long-lived, faint) to blue giants and supergiants (massive, hot, and short-lived). Our Sun is a middle-aged G-type main sequence star.
As stars exhaust their hydrogen fuel, their evolution depends on mass. Lower-mass stars become red giants then white dwarfs. More massive stars undergo successive fusion stages, end in supernova explosions, and leave behind neutron stars or black holes.
Stars vary in brightness, size, and color. They are classified using spectral types (O, B, A, F, G, K, M) based on surface temperature and absorption lines. For example, O- and B-type stars are hot and blue; M-type are cool and red.
Stellar remnants include white dwarfs (Earth-sized cores of former stars), neutron stars (city-sized remnants of supernovae), and black holes (extreme-density objects from the most massive stars).
Stars are not static—many rotate, exhibit magnetic activity (like sunspots and flares), and broadcast stellar winds. Their lifecycle enriches the interstellar medium with heavier elements, seeding future generations of stars and planets.
Stars often exist in groups—binary or systems within star clusters and galaxies. Their properties are studied via brightness, spectra, parallax, variability, and statistical surveys by missions like Gaia and Kepler.
Sources
APODs including "Star"
M55: Color Magnitude Diagram
23 February 2001
This color "picture" of globular star cluster M55 may not look like any star cluster you've ever seen. Still, it shows a most fundamental view for students of stellar astronomy. In the picture, a Color Magnitude Diagram (CMD), M55's individual stars are represented as dots whose color indicates relative temperature, red (cool) to blue (hot). Position in the CMD does not correspond to a star's location in the sky, though. Instead, it corresponds to a measured astronomical color, (B-V color) read off the bottom scale, and a brightness in magnitudes (M) on the left hand scale. The temperature for each star can also be found by reading the equivalent scale at the top, where the Sun would have a temperature of 6,000 kelvins (K). Brightness relative to the Sun's luminosity (Sun = 1) is given on the scale at the right. The globular cluster stars clearly fall into distinct groups dramatically visible in this CMD. The broad swath extending diagonally from the lower right is the cluster's main sequence. A sharp turn toward the upper right hand corner follows the red giant branch while the blue giants are found grouped in the upper left. M55's stars were formed at the same time and at first were all located along the main sequence by mass, lower mass stars at the lower right. Over time, higher mass stars have evolved off the main sequence into red, then blue giants and beyond. The exact position of the sharp turn-off from the main sequence to the red giant branch measures the cluster's age.