Kronos: destroyer of worlds

A metal-rich star could have engulfed 15 Earth’s worth of rocky planets A star may have devoured more than a dozen planets, according to the latest interpretations of its strange chemistry. The star, named Kronos after the child eating Titan of Greek mythology, is part of a binary pair with another star named Krios. Normally you would expect these stars to be twins, but Kronos is particularly rich in rock-forming elements such as aluminium, silicon and iron when compared with Krios. However, volatile elements which are commonly found as a gas, like oxygen and carbon, are not as abundant as you would expect if the cause of the difference stemmed from the star’s age or origin.

“All of the elements that would make up a rocky planet are exactly the elements that are enhanced on Kronos … so that provides a strong argument for a planet engulfment scenario,” says Semyeong Oh from Princeton University, who led the study. www. princeton.edu

We can only imagine what the worlds Kronos consumed might have looked like