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“A Shooting Star.” Perhaps one of the most prevalent scientific inaccuracies in popular culture. As I hope most of you already know, those bright streaks across the night sky are in actuality pieces of space junk burning up as they enter the Earth’s atmosphere. If the real shooting star pictured above came anywhere near that close, we’d be in some seriously deep shit. With a tail 13 light years long, Mira is helping NASA astronomers learn more about how stars similar to the Sun die. [via via]