How do you measure the mass of a star?
Well, according to famed cosmologist Albert Einstein, you can try to solve this problem by looking at the subtle bending of starlight as it encounters the immense gravity of another, closer star.
By measuring that light deflection, you could, in theory at least, weigh out the mass of the target star.
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There’s only one problem: Einstein never thought that we could actually make this measurement. The legendary scientist said that “there [was] no hope of observing [that distortion] … directly,” in a 1936 study published in the journal Science. Read more…
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