bornagainathiest Posted January 23, 2014 Share Posted January 23, 2014 http://www.universetoday.com/108386/bright-new-supernova-blows-up-in-nearby-m82-the-cigar-galaxy/ Thanks, BAA Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ravenstar Posted January 23, 2014 Share Posted January 23, 2014 Wow, it's massive! I wonder how many (and how) other objects around it get affected? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bornagainathiest Posted January 23, 2014 Author Share Posted January 23, 2014 Wow, it's massive! I wonder how many (and how) other objects around it get affected? We're in the process of finding that out Ravenstar. Not for this specific supernova, but sn1987a. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SN_1987A If you check out the 1994 - 2009 animation you'll see that the shockwave from that detonation runs into a ring of debris (dust and gas probably) expelled by the star 20,000 years earlier. Maybe something similar will happen when this star blows? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eta_Carinae Do check out the wonderful, rosy-red Hubble pic at it's maximum resolution (1 Mb.) Can you see a kind of pinkish dumbell shape that's tilted at an angle to us? Two vast, ballooning masses of hot gas laced with threads of darker dust have erupted from the star's north and south poles. It's surmised that like a giant version of the planet Saturn, the star has a thick ring of dense material encircling it's equator. So when it 'burped' in 1730, the explosion couldn't erupt equally in all directions from the star's surface. Instead, the exploding stuff was confined around the star's middle and was forced out in two plumes, above and below the equatorial ring. Anyway, if Eta Carinae does blow soon, these twin plumes might well be superheated by the shockwave and glow, just like sn1987a. The major difference being that Eta's only 7,500 to 8,000 light years away, whereas sn1987a was 168,000. However, both of these guys are in the far southern sky, where nobody in the US can see them. The one I'm wanting to see go supernova is... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betelgeuse ...it's got everything going for it. Visible to the naked eye. Well-studied. Surrounded by rings and nebulae of gas and dust. Close enough to be spectacular, but not so close as to be dangerous. (approx. 640 light years) Should be quite a light show! Thanks, BAA Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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