Every superhero — or antihero — needs a sidekick. And it turns out that Beetlejuice Betelgeuse does indeed have one! The red supergiant star found in the constellation Orion has captivated stargazers for millennia, and while scientists have long theorized it had a companion of some sort due to its periodic dimming, no one had ever seen it. Until recently! World, meet Betelbuddy.
After the Gemini North Telescope in Hawaii imaged a faint potential companion to Betelgeuse, Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) researchers used NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and the Hubble Space Telescope to examine Betelgeuse in more detail. And the timing was perfect — Betelbuddy, as the tiny companion is nicknamed — was at its maximum distance from its much larger, much brighter neighbor. (Betelgeuse is about 700 times the size of our sun and thousands of times brighter.) Finally, researchers made detailed, concrete observations.
