Those of us who have gone through a midlife crisis know that it is a time of really great emotional turmoil. Everyone who reaches a certain age goes through it. Now, it has been revealed that even massive celestial bodies like the Sun are not safe from it. And yes, this also indicates that our Sun will also die. A new study by the European Space Agency (ESA) has revealed that the Sun has entered its middle age, which is estimated to be about 4.57 billion years. The Sun also appears to be going through a mid-life crisis with frequent solar flares, coronal mass ejections (CMEs) and solar storms. The study was conducted with the help of data collected by the Gaia spacecraft. The Sun is currently at the peak of its 11-year solar cycle, which has resulted in frequent solar flares, coronal mass ejections, and solar storms. As the cycle ends, the frequency of these phenomena will decrease. As the Sun ages, the hydrogen in the Sun’s core will run out and the Sun will turn into a red giant star, lowering its surface temperature and cooling. According to the ESA, as the Sun reaches the end of its life cycle, it will become a faint white dwarf star. Orlagh Creevey of France’s Observatoire de la Côte d’Azur dug into the data by studying some of the oldest stars in our Galaxy with surface temperatures between 3000K and 10000K. Orlagh said: “We wanted to have a really clean sample of stars with high precision measurements.” The study concluded that the Sun will reach its maximum temperatures nearly 8 billion years into the future and then decrease its surface temperature and increase in size. Orlagh said, “If we don’t understand our own Sun, and there are many things we don’t know about it, how can we expect to understand all the other stars that make up our wonderful galaxy.” NASA, on the other hand, had earlier lamented in its report, “As it begins to die, the Sun will expand into a red giant star, becoming so large that it will swallow Mercury and Venus, and possibly Earth as well.” .Scientists predict the Sun is a little less than halfway through its life and will take another 5 billion years or so before it becomes a white dwarf.”
