Researchers from the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom (UK) have discovered the smallest ever known star in the universe. The star is named EBLM J0555-57Ab and is situated six hundred light years away.

The star is slightly larger in size than our Solar System’s planet Saturn. Researchers say that it is as small as any star could possibly be and the mass is only that much that can let the fusion of hydrogen nuclei into helium. If the star would have been smaller than its current size, its centre would not have been able to sustain the fusion and it would have converted into a brown dwarf from a star. Owing to its small size, the gravitational pull at its stellar surface is 300 times stronger than what we feel on Earth!  

The star was found by WASP which is a jointly carried out plane finding experiment by four Universities of UK namely Universities of Keele, Warwick, Leicester and St Andrews. The researchers phrased their achievement saying that finding a star can at times be harder than finding a planet!  

Scientists predict the possibility of Earth like planets with liquid water orbiting the star.  The study will appear in the journal Astronomy and Astrophysics.