HEAPOW: Overcooked Fossil Jellyfish (2010 Jan 04)

Find out the latest thinking about our universe.
Post Reply
User avatar
bystander
Apathetic Retiree
Posts: 21571
Joined: Mon Aug 28, 2006 2:06 pm
Location: Oklahoma

HEAPOW: Overcooked Fossil Jellyfish (2010 Jan 04)

Post by bystander » Sun Feb 28, 2010 4:11 pm

Image HEAPOW: Overcooked Fossil Jellyfish (2010 Jan 04)
The messy process by which stars explode into their environments is still much of a puzzle. How much of the environment is shaped by the star's formation and development in the millennia of millennia before the star dies? How does energy from the explosion get transferred into the material shot out into space? How does space become enriched by material processed by the star? Observations by the Japanese-US Suzaku Observatory of the supernova remnant IC 443 (also called the "Jellyfish Nebula") have provided astronomers with an important new clue. X-rays from the nebula detected by Suzaku are shown in false color above, superimposed on an optical image of the Jellyfish. By measuring the X-ray spectrum of the emission, Suzaku discovered radiation produced by the capture of free-floating electrons by completely stripped nuclei of silicon and sulfur. This "radiative recombination" emission requires extremely high temperatures (more than 50 million degrees Celsius) which could only have existed shortly after the explosion of the star - in effect, fossil radiation dating back more than 4000 years to the time of the stellar explosion.
Suzaku Finds "Fossil" Fireballs from Supernovae
<< Previous HEAPOW High Energy Astrophysics
Picture of the Week
Next HEAPOW >>
[/b]

Post Reply