4 years from now, a new star has appeared in our sky. But there was a typo

Well, it's of course a parade that breaks down. A spectacular astronomical event planned for 2022 will not happen after all.

In early 2017, scientists predicted the collision of two stars in the constellation Cygnus – which could result in a rare and wonderful phenomenon, visible to the naked eye. And the news is spread like wildfire.

The two stars, located only 1,800 light-years away from Earth, are currently locked in a spiral death dance. According to the researchers, in 2022, in just a few years, they would collide.

And it would not be just a little shot in the night sky. When the binary star system KIC 9832227 finally merged, it would produce a bright red nova – increasing its brightness by 10,000 times, which would be visible for some time.

Now, however, this prediction has been corrected.

* Sad trombone *

A team of researchers led by astronomer Quentin Socia of the San Diego State University has meticulously leaned on mathematics and resulted in a different outcome.

And the original researcher – astronomer Larry Molnar of Calvin College – accepted this new discovery.

"Good science makes verifiable predictions," said Molnar.

"There have been a few other newspapers that have tried to make fun of our project, and we've been able to go back – critics who just do not fly – but this one is flying, and I think they've a good argument, which illustrates how science can correct itself. "

The problem was found with the data that Molnar and his team used to make the prediction.

KIC 9832227 is a fascinating system. The two stars are closely related one to the other, which takes them only 11 hours to perform a complete orbit. And they are so close that they actually share parts of their atmosphere, which is called a contact binary.

They are also a binary eclipses, oriented in the right way that, in orbit, they are eclipsed from our point of view here on Earth.

The prediction was based on the minimum light timing – that is, the mid-eclipse point in which the light of the binary system is the lowest – from all available sources.

Molnar and his team used Calvin Observatory data between 2013 and 2016. Between 2007 and 2013, they used data from other observatories. There was a large gap in the data before 2007, but in 1999, an observation was made as part of the Northern Variability Survey.

Socia and his team have acquired archived data from 2003, taken as part of NASA's Ames Vulcan project. And they found that eclipses occurred half an hour later than predicted by Molnar's melting hypothesis.

They relaunched numbers and schedules after 2007 were checked. But this 1999 data point was not perfect – an hour later than expected.

Guilty party? A typo.

Yes. In the document that originally described the 1999 data, published in 2004, a typographical error resulted in a misrepresentation of the 12-hour eclipse delay. This error was brought into the calculations of the Molnar team.

It is interesting to note that the typo did not occur in the pre-print of the article (this is the date dd, or julian modified, in Table 6).

The eclipse could not possibly have happened at the time when the article published said it either. Socia calculated where KIC 9832227 would have been at that moment. It would have been under the horizon. The telescope would not have been able to see it.

That does not mean that at one point KIC 9832227 will not become kaboom; but it is not in 2022.

And yes, we are a little defeated about it; but ultimately, while science can give, its ability to break away is just as important.

"This is arguably the most important part of the scientific process." Knowledge progresses the most when bold predictions are made, and people question and test these predictions, Socia said.

"Often, the most exciting discoveries occur when our expectations are not met.This is a good example of how scientists from different parts of the world can work together to better understand how our universe works and bring new pieces to the puzzle. "

So, it's not going to be the KIC 9832227. But eventually, a binary star will collide, and there are now a lot of eyes looking.

"The authors of the manuscript do not question our fundamental premise, which is to say" it's something you should look for, it's something that can be found, "Molnar said.

"It's actually because they agree with this fundamental premise that they have dug deeper, and the search for an imminent stellar merger is continuing."

The search was published in The astrophysical journal.