'First of its kind': Triple star system detected by astronomers in deep space

Imagine three stars orbiting each other in deep space with each of them being the size of at least 12 suns! That is the discovery that has become a popular topic among astronomers who are looking to use the information to understand the cosmos a bit better.

The triple star system was described by experts as “something that is unlike anything that has been seen before” and according to the research published in the Royal Astronomical Society’s Monthly Notices, the researchers believe that there was a fourth star in the system, but it was most probably “eaten” by the other three stars.

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“As far as we know, it is the first of its kind ever detected. We know of many tertiary star systems (three-star systems), but they are typically significantly less massive. The massive stars in this triple are very close together – it is a compact system,” Alejandro Vigna-Gomez, one of the main authors of the study and postdoc at the Niels Bohr International Academy, said in a press statement.

At first, the researchers thought that the system had two stars, but citizen scientists were able to track the third star using data from NASA's Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) observatory.

It is not common for triple star systems to exist in deep space with NASA putting the estimate within ten percent of the total star systems in the universe at this point. The first discovery of this kind was made in September 2021, but this system is larger than any prior discovery in this field.