Category Astronomy/Space

Galaxy-scale outflow driven by the central black hole. Credit: ESA

New theory predicts origins of molecules in destructive cosmic outflows. The existence of large numbers of molecules in winds powered by supermassive black holes at the centers of galaxies has puzzled astronomers since they were discovered more than a decade ago. Molecules trace the coldest parts of space, and black holes are the most energetic phenomena in the universe, so finding molecules in black hole winds was like discovering ice in a furnace.

Astronomers questioned how anything could survive the heat of the energetic outflows, but a new theory from researchers in Northwestern University’s Center for Interdisciplinary Research and Exploration in Astrophysics (CIERA) predicts that these molecules are not survivors at a...

First stars of the Milky Way. Credit: Gabriel Pérez, SMM (IAC)

Researchers at the IAC have identified a star which is a key to the formation of the first chemical elements in the Galaxy. The study presents the discovery of one of the stars with the least content of “metals” (heavy elements) known. The star is 7,500 light years from Earth, in the halo of the Milky Way, and is along the line of sight to the constellation of the Lynx. The star is still on the Main Sequence, the stage at which most stars spend the major part of their lives. The source of energy of these stars is, as always, the fusión of hydrogen in their cores, and their surface temperaturas and luminosities are almost constant with time. Another of its properties is its low mass, around 0...

This is a magneto-hydrodynamic 3-D simulations of a relativistic jet. Credit: G. Bodo and P. Rossi (INAF-Osservatorio Astrofisico di Torino, Italy) and A. Mignone (Torino University, Italy).

Researchers have discovered a peculiar spiral jet with many twists. A blazar is an astronomical object within an elliptical galaxy, at whose centre there is a supermassive black hole which emits jets of radiation and particles with huge energies. When these are directed towards the Earth we can detect them. They are among the most energetic phenomena in the universe.

In the second half of last year the blazar CTA 102, which is 7,600 million light years from Earth, brightened considerably, drawing the attention of all the astronomers...

Jan Egedal, professor of physics at UW-Madison who lead an exploration of magnetic reconnection, stands beside a chamber used for experiments in that exotic phenomenon. Magnetic reconnection seems to be involved in some of the most violent explosions in the universe; the recent study was the clearest view of the magnetic reconnection ever measured in space. The results “blew my mind,” he says. Credit: David Tenenbaum/UW-Madison

Space physicists at University of Wisconsin-Madison have just released unprecedented detail on a bizarre phenomenon that powers the northern lights, solar flares and coronal mass ejections, CMEs (the biggest explosions in our solar system)...