After nearly a century of searching, Betelgeuse, one of the most famous stars in the sky, has finally revealed its companion ! An international team led by Miguel Montargès, an astronomer at LIRA, and involving several members of the laboratory, has obtained the clearest image to date of this previously elusive star, known as Betelgeuse B.
Located in the constellation of Orion, Betelgeuse is a red supergiant whose variations in brightness have long puzzled astronomers. Using the SPHERE instrument on ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT) in Chile, researchers managed to distinguish its faint companion despite the intense glare of the primary star. Observations suggest that Betelgeuse B could be two to three times as massive as the Sun.
Published in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics, this study provides new insights into the evolution of Betelgeuse and the influence of its companion on its future. Further observations will help characterise this binary system, whose primary star will one day explode as a supernova.
