by MarkBour » Wed Nov 08, 2017 5:54 pm
I don't know if this has already been done, but one could check the hypothesis that this is opaque dust near the star casting shadows on the reflection nebula of reflecting gas further out ... if one can get high enough resolution, one should see the same shadows pass the star itself a little prior to them showing much larger on the surface of the nebula.* If one can get that data, it also should be able to be used to determine some distances.
* (I assume they can't resolve a shadow crossing the face of the star, but I'm guessing they could get the light profile showing dimming.)
It's interesting that the whole arrangement is acting like a nature-created magnifier for viewing the opaque gas cloud(s). Or, like a movie projector onto the reflection nebula acting as a screen.
BDanielMayfield suggested that the opaque dust might be in orbit around the star, rather than that it is just passing the star once. As Ann already pointed out, and the "R Mon" link in the APOD text mentions, R Mon is a binary with an accretion disk, so that is consistent with this statement. (In fact, they characterize the binary as "a very young active Herbig Ae/Be star".) If I'm reading it correctly, the link characterizes the larger star as being perhaps 10.4 M⊙. I wonder what tidal tug-of-war may possibly be actively creating the accretion disk and if this disk is the cloud that is casting the shadows.
Actually, although I like the "leading idea" just fine, and the following is only a flight of fancy, the whole region does look eerily like a smoldering ember, and the reflection nebula looks like the cloud of smoke rising from it. Why is the nebula laid out in a cone just to one side of this star?
I don't know if this has already been done, but one could check the hypothesis that this is opaque dust near the star casting shadows on the reflection nebula of reflecting gas further out ... if one can get high enough resolution, one should see the same shadows pass the star itself a little prior to them showing much larger on the surface of the nebula.* If one can get that data, it also should be able to be used to determine some distances.
* (I assume they can't resolve a shadow crossing the face of the star, but I'm guessing they could get the light profile showing dimming.)
It's interesting that the whole arrangement is acting like a nature-created magnifier for viewing the opaque gas cloud(s). Or, like a movie projector onto the reflection nebula acting as a screen.
BDanielMayfield suggested that the opaque dust might be in orbit around the star, rather than that it is just passing the star once. As Ann already pointed out, and the "R Mon" link in the APOD text mentions, R Mon is a binary with an accretion disk, so that is consistent with this statement. (In fact, they characterize the binary as "a very young active Herbig Ae/Be star".) If I'm reading it correctly, the link characterizes the larger star as being perhaps 10.4 M⊙. I wonder what tidal tug-of-war may possibly be actively creating the accretion disk and if this disk is the cloud that is casting the shadows.
Actually, although I like the "leading idea" just fine, and the following is only a flight of fancy, the whole region does look eerily like a smoldering ember, and the reflection nebula looks like the cloud of smoke rising from it. Why is the nebula laid out in a cone just to one side of this star?