ALMA | National Radio Astronomy Observatory | 2020 Jul 02
Astronomers created a stunning new image showing celestial fireworks in star cluster G286.21+0.17.
Most stars in the universe, including our Sun, were born in massive star clusters. These clusters are the building blocks of galaxies, but their formation from dense molecular clouds is still largely a mystery.
The image of cluster G286.21+0.17, caught in the act of formation, is a multi-wavelength mosaic made out of more than 750 individual radio observations with the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) and 9 infrared images from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. The cluster is located in the Carina region of our galaxy, about 6000 light-years away.
Dense clouds made of molecular gas (purple ‘fireworks streamers’) are revealed by ALMA. The telescope observed the motions of turbulent gas falling into the cluster, forming dense cores that ultimately create individual stars.
The stars in the image are revealed by their infrared light, as seen by Hubble, including a large group of stars bursting out from one side of the cloud. The powerful winds and radiation from the most massive of these stars are blasting away the molecular clouds, leaving faint wisps of glowing, hot dust (shown in yellow and red).
“This image shows stars in various stages of formation within this single cluster,” said Yu Cheng ...
Hubble revealed about a thousand newly-formed stars with a wide range of masses. Additionally, ALMA showed that there is a lot more mass present in dense gas that still has to undergo collapse. “Overall the process may take at least a million years to complete,” Cheng added. ...
Gas Kinematics of the Massive Protocluster G286.21+0.17 Revealed by ALMA ~ Yu Cheng et al
- Astrophysical Journal 894(2):87 (2020 May 10) DOI: 10.3847/1538-4357/ab879f
- arXiv.org > astro-ph > arXiv:2005.08197 > 17 May 2020
Stellar Variability in a Forming Massive Star Cluster ~ Yu Cheng et al
- Astrophysical Journal 897(1):51 (2020 July 01) DOI: 10.3847/1538-4357/ab93bc
- arXiv.org > astro-ph > arXiv:2005.08198 > 17 May 2020