Astronomy professor discovers super stars

Professor Paul Crowther, of the Department of Astrophysics at Sheffield University, found the stars while working at the European Southern Observatory in Chile.

The observatory, supported by 14 European governments including the UK, includes the so-called Very Large Telescope, which was used by the team to examine their discoveries.

According to Prof Crowther the stars are double the mass of any previously found by scientists and were detected in two young clusters – one of which is 22,000 light years away from the sun.

The professor said stars with surface temperatures of over 40,000C, more than seven times hotter than the sun and millions of time brighter, were found during the work.

It is thought that they would have weighed a great deal more when they were first formed, or born, from huge clouds of gas and dust, he said.

"Unlike humans, these stars are born heavy and lose weight as they age. Being a little over a million years old, the most extreme star is already 'middle-aged' and has undergone an intense weight loss programme," he explained.

"It has shed an a fifth of its initial mass over that time, or more than 50 solar masses.

"Owing to the rarity of these monsters, I think it is unlikely that this new record will be broken any time soon."

The brightest star, named R136 by astronomers, is close to 10 million times brighter than the sun and is thought to have been created by smaller stars merging together.