14 DAY TRIAL // Having taken the time to study MY Camelopardalis, the most massive binary system thus far documented by science, researchers found that the stars that comprise it are well on track to one day merge with one another.
In a paper in the journal Astronomy and Astrophysics, astronomers explain that, according to data obtained with the help of the Calar Alto Observatory in Spain, the stars that make up this system now sit strikingly close to one another.
They are busy circling around one another, and as illustrated in the artistic rendering included in the gallery below, they are both slightly deformed because of the speed they are rotating at and the gravitation pull of their companion.
In fact, evidence at hand indicates that these stars sit so close to one another and are spinning so fast that their orbital period is less than 1.2 days, scientists with Spain's Asociación RUVID write in the journal Astronomy and Astrophysics.
As detailed by Science Daily, astronomers expect that, at some point in the future, these stars will go the extra mile and merge. Seeing how each packs the equivalent of 32 to 38 times the mass of the Sun, the resulting celestial body will be a mammoth star of over 60 solar masses.
