2/27/2023 0 Comments Webb space telescopeThe two stars in Wolf-Rayet 140 produce shells of dust every eight years that look like rings. Burning hotter than in its youth, a Wolf-Rayet star generates powerful winds that push huge amounts of gas into space. Some other Wolf-Rayet systems form dust, but none is known to make rings as Wolf-Rayet 140 does. When it collapses, it will form a black hole. A Wolf-Rayet star is an O-type star, born with at least 25 times more mass than our Sun, that is nearing the end of its life. The duo is collectively known as Wolf-Rayet 140. Located just over 5,000 light-years from Earth, according to CTV News. The new image reveals a remarkable cosmic sight: at least 17 concentric dust rings emanating from a pair of stars. NASA on Wednesday, released a new image from the James Webb Space Telescope of dust rings, looking like a “fingerprint” where two stars are interacting with each other. Each ring was created when the stars came close together and their stellar winds collided, compressing the gas and forming dust.Ĭredits: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, JPL-Caltech Very bright objects in Webb pictures can have this "snowflake" effect.The two stars in Wolf-Rayet 140 produce shells of dust every eight years that look like rings, as seen in this image from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope. These were simply artifacts resulting from the telescope's segmented mirror system. In the initial Webb renderings of WR 140 that appeared on social media, eight very prominent spikes of light came off the central stars. PAHs produced by stars are thought to enrich the carbon content throughout the Universe. You find them on burnt toast and in the exhaust from motor vehicles. The shells are dominated by polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, PAHs. This has enabled scientists to determine their composition. And it's Miri that has not only taken the picture at the top of this page but also done the analysis of the light coming from the dust shells. It was the UK ATC that led the design and construction - with the US space agency - of Webb's Mid Infrared Instrument, or Miri. "Also it goes through into the galaxy and changes the way entire galaxy can seem. "The dust is important because we know that this is stuff that will go off and mix with other gases and dust in the galaxy and make new generations of planets", University of Auckland astrophysicist Jan Eldridge said. "Before we had seen sketches of one of the innermost rings but the is so much more sensitive, so much more high resolution, we can really see what has been hidden" - University of Auckland astrophysicist Jan Eldridge This explains the slight unevenness in the bull's-eye pattern, but the angle at which Webb is viewing the scene also plays its part. Interestingly, this dust production is at its greatest when the two stars move towards and away from each other, not at closest approach. Their winds compress to create dust particles. These are pumped out as the two objects come close together in their eight-year orbit around each other. The Wolf-Rayet, however, is probably now only 10 solar masses.īut it's the binary's properties and behaviour that explain the production of the dust shells. This one likely started out as big as its companion, an O-type star which is 30 times the mass of our Sun. They billow huge gaseous winds into space. A big one that's reaching the end of its life. The WR in the name of the system refers to "Wolf-Rayet". To see 17 like this is amazing, and shows the power of James Webb," said Dr Olivia Jones from the UK Astronomy Technology Centre (UK ATC) in Edinburgh which helped to build the telescope. "Previous observations of WR 140 revealed the presence of up to three shells. Put another way, it's 70,000 times the distance between Earth and our Sun. That's a distance that's hard to comprehend. Those rings are dust shells that extend outwards over 10 trillion kilometres. It's a double star system, or a binary, some 5000 light-years from Earth. Many people were rather puzzled by it when it first popped up on social media in September, but astronomers in the know were delighted because of the insights they could draw. It's one of the most striking images yet seen from the new super space telescope James Webb. Photo: NASA / ESA / CSA / STScI / JPL-Caltech Each ring was created when the stars came close together and their stellar winds collided, compressing the gas and forming dust. The two stars in Wolf-Rayet 140 produce shells of dust every eight years that look like rings, as seen in this image from NASA's James Webb Space Telescope.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |