ExploraTour: A Peek into the Lives of the Stars
The History of the Universe in 60 Seconds or Less - Dr. Eric Schulman - streaming RealVideo (1 min. 16 sec.) from NSF
Do the most massive stars last longer than smaller ones?
Interestingly enough smaller stars have much longer lifetimes than massive ones. The temperatures in the center of massive stars are hotter than those in their smaller counterparts. As a result nuclear reactions, which release energy within the star, proceed more rapidly using up the stars fuel in a short time.
The smallest stars have lifetimes that exceed an astounding 3 trillion years. They are evolving very slowly and have barely changed since the beginning of the Universe. In contrast, very large hot O and B type stars last a mere 10 million years or less. Our own sun is about 5 billion years old already and will probably last for some 5 billion more years.
