Aside from our sun, do other stars in the Milky Way have a direct effect on the Earth?
1 Answer
Mar 25, 2016
No stars at present have a direct effect on Earth other than the Sun.
Explanation:
All stars other than the Sun have too little energy output and are too far away to affect the Earth directly.
If however a star goes supernova within about 10 light years of the Earth, the gamma rays from the star could do a lot of damage to the Earth's ozone layer and expose the Earth's surface to massive amounts of radiation.
Fortunately at present there are no supernova candidate stars within range to be cause of concern. This can change over time. When the Milky Way and Andromeda galaxies collide in about 4 billion years, this could change.
