Why do some stars twinkle and others don't?

Answer 1

The actual TRUE answer is all to do with wheather the star has planets orbiting it. Our star, no matter how huge is still effected by the gravitational pull of each planet surrounding it. The small gravitational fields of each planet pull the star in different directions. Even though the gravitational pull of each planet is minute the planets are placed in different points around the star pulling it in either direction. As the gravitational pull moves at different points around the star it looks like it is twinkling. The stars which do not twinkle do not have any bodies around it with a large enough gravitational pull to be visible. They may be young stars which are still forming thier own solar systems or indeed very old stars which have grown and burned out any planets around it.

Answer 2

Stars don't really twinkle. It's a visual effect of turbulence in the atmosphere. Any star can twinkle but the brightest rarely do. The turbulence is unpredictable so stars can twinkle more at some times than others and different parts of the sky can have stars that twinkle more or less. Planets do not twinkle at all.

Answer 3

Why Some Stars Twinkle

Answer 4

My God. The ignorance. It is not because of atmospheric conditions. The same stars twinkle every night. Jupiter never twinkles (EVER). It is outside of our atmosphere, its reflected light has to pass through it same as a star. So it's not the atmosphere. As for orbiting planets and gravity, yeah right. The twinkling of some stars is fantastic red green and blue. And it happens rapidly like bang-bang-bang. This is not some slow effect caused by planetary forces on a star. What happened to the possibility that we just don't really know yet?? NASA doesn't know everything, they guess like crazy at stuff that they claim to "know". I think we just don't really know but are too ignorant and arrogant to admit it.

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PS, totally surprised that nobody responded "because the ones that twinkle are gay and the others are not".

Answer 5

Stars (except Sun) appear as tiny dots in the sky; as their light travels through the many layers of the Earth's atmosphere, its light is bent (refracted) many times and in random directions. This random refraction results for a star to look as if it moves a bit, and our eye interprets this as twinkling.

Stars closer to the horizon appear to twinkle more than stars that are overhead - this is because the light of stars near the horizon has to travel through more air than the light of stars overhead and so is subject to more refraction. Also, planets do not usually twinkle, because they are so close to us; they appear big enough that the twinkling is not noticeable (except when the air is extremely turbulent).

Stars would not appear to twinkle if we viewed them from outer space (or from a planet/moon that didn't have an atmosphere).

Answer 6

There are billions of things between us and even the closest star. Light from stars is affected by the gravity of everything that it passes on the way to us and it is blocked by every object that momentarily comes between us and the star as we move and it moves. There are fewer things between us and the closer stars so they don't appear to twinkle.

Answer 7

stars twinkle mostly because of dust or water vapor in the air. brighter stars might twinkle less.

Answer 8

It all depends on the distance of the star, and the age of the star. The closest star to earth besides the sun is over 1.5 million light years away, and light travels at 5000+feet per second, so the nearest star is far, far away. As a star gets older (this happens over millions of years mind you) it starts to fade and it eventually blows up. The names of the stages for an aging star are a red giant,white dwarf and so on.

Answer 9

maybe those which not twinkles are not a star.. those are planets

Answer 10

twinkled stars are unmarried