New telescope images provide best evidence yet that the bright red star Betelgeuse is actually 2 stars in disguise

Betelgeuse, the bright reddish star that marks Orion's shoulder, has kept skywatchers company for thousands of years — and it may have had company of its own the whole time.

Astronomers say they've captured the clearest image yet of a faint star orbiting tightly around Betelgeuse, in what they're calling the strongest evidence so far that the famous red supergiant isn't flying solo. The find was announced by the European Southern Observatory (ESO) on Tuesday (July 28) and detailed in a new paper in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics.

Betelgeuse, usually one of the top 10 brightest stars visible from Earth, naturally swells and shrinks as it pulses across a cycle of 400 days, according to NASA, which causes the star to wax and wane in brightness. But for decades, scientists have puzzled over an extra pattern: ...