They don’t call it a great-nova does nothing.
Just in time for the holidays, NASA released a dazzling image of an exploding star that looks a lot like a shiny ornament sitting on a Christmas tree.
A stunning new image of Cassiopeia A (Cas A), which lies about 11,000 light-years from Earth and is one of the most studied supernova remnants, was captured by the agency’s renowned James Webb Space Telescope.
The advanced technology of the telescope’s Near Infrared Camera managed to capture the exploding star at a resolution previously unattainable.
“With NIRCam’s resolution, we can now see how the dying star literally disintegrated when it exploded, leaving filaments like tiny shards of glass behind,” Danny Milisavljevic of Purdue University, who led the research team, said in a statement.
NIRCam’s resolution is able to detect small knots of gas, consisting of sulfur, oxygen, argon and neon from the star itself. NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, D. Milisavljevic (Purdue University), T. Temim (Princeton University), I. De Looze (Gent University).
“It’s incredible after years of studying Cas A to sort out those details, which give us a transformative picture of how this star explodes.”
In the new NIRCam images, the colors of Cas A’s infrared light have been translated into colors previously invisible to the human eye, allowing researchers to see details never seen before.
Notably, clumps represented in bright orange and light pink that form the shells in supernovae have been exposed, showing the “tiniest knots of gas” that will one day form new stars and planetary systems.
The Green Giant is invisible under NIRCam, but visible under mid-infrared. NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, D. Milisavljevic (Purdue University), T. Temim (Princeton University), I. De Looze (Gent University)
The rim of Cas A’s inner shell — which exploded about 340 years ago from our vantage point — also glows orange and red in a pattern that resembles the smoke in a bonfire.
One aspect that has so far puzzled researchers is the large loop of green light that glows bright green in the mid-infrared but disappears under NIRCam.
Dubbed the “Green Monster”, the ionized gas is likely the result of supernova debris pushing and sculpting the gas left behind by the star before it exploded.
Cassiopeia A is one of the most studied supernova remnants. NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, D. Milisavljevic (Purdue University), T. Temim (Princeton University), I. De Looze (Gent University)
Additionally, NASA scientists were “absolutely stunned” to find a blob in the lower right corner of the camera’s view that “looked like the progeny of a major supernova.”
Located about 170 light-years behind the supernova remnant, Baby Cas A is an echo of light, where light from the star’s old explosion has reached and heated distant dust, NASA said.
The remarkable new image is just the latest in a series taken by the Webb telescope since it began operating last year.
One of the many celebratory images he released depicts a colorful close-up of a dozen stars at birth, while another captures the final “performance” of a dying star in insane detail.
Categories: Trending
Source: thtrangdai.edu.vn/en/
