Gaia Telescope Reveals Precise Date of the Milky Way's Last Act of Galactic Cannibalism
Video Credit: Wibbitz Top Stories - Duration: 01:30s - Published
Gaia Telescope Reveals Precise Date of the Milky Way's Last Act of Galactic Cannibalism
Gaia Telescope Reveals Precise , Date of the Milky Way's Last , Act of Galactic Cannibalism.
Space.com reports that the latest findings from the Gaia
space telescope suggest that our Milky Way Galaxy may
have cannibalized a smaller galaxy relatively recently.
.
The last major collision between the Milky Way
and another galaxy appears to have occurred billions
of years closer to now than previously believed.
Scientists have long known that the
Milky Way was formed through a series
of violent collisions with other galaxies.
.
These massive collisions distribute stars
from the consumed galaxy throughout the
halo that surrounds the Milky Way's main disk.
.
Galactic cannibalism sends "wrinkles"
through the galaxy, impacting different
families of stars in a number of ways.
Gaia now looks to retell the story of the
Milky Way by quantifying those wrinkles.
We get wrinklier as we age,
but our work reveals that the
opposite is true for the Milky Way.
It’s a sort of cosmic Benjamin Button,
getting less wrinkly over time.
By looking at how these
wrinkles dissipate over time,
we can trace when the Milky Way
experienced its last big crash –
and it turns out this happened billions
of years later than we thought, Thomas Donlon, Study team leader of the Rensselaer Polytechnic
Institute and University of Alabama scientist, via Space.com.
Astronomers have only been aware of these
wrinkles since Gaia discovered them in 2018.
.
The latest findings represent the first time they have
been extensively investigated to find the
precise timing of the collision that spawned them.
Astronomers Think Powerful , Magnetic Winds Drive Growth , of Supermassive Black Holes.
'Newsweek' reports that scientists may have
unraveled the mystery of how supermassive
black holes are able to become so massive.
According to a new paper, a powerful magnetic
wind, comparable to water swirling around
a drain, is what allows these massive cosmic
phenomena to reach such immense sizes.
A supermassive black hole is typically millions to
billions of times more massive than our own sun
and is often found at the center of most galaxies. .
The paper, which was published in the journal 'Astronomy
and Astrophysics,' focused on the black hole at the
center of a galaxy about 120 million light-years from Earth.
This galaxy, known as ESO320-G030, is much more
active than our own Milky Way, with a rate of star
formation 10 times that of our own galaxy.
Using the Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA) telescope,
researchers found a strong, rotating, magnetized
wind spinning around the center of the black hole.
Using the Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA) telescope,
researchers found a strong, rotating, magnetized
wind spinning around the center of the black hole.
Since this galaxy is very
luminous in the infrared,
telescopes can resolve
striking details in its center. , Susanne Aalto, study co-author and a professor
of radio astronomy at Chalmers University
of Technology, via 'Newsweek'.
'Newsweek' reports that the team now hopes to observe the
centers of other galaxies to confirm if this process is what
enables a supermassive black hole's immense growth.
Far from all questions about this
process are answered. In our
observations we see clear evidence
of a rotating wind that helps
regulate the growth of the
galaxy's central black hole. , Mark Gorski, study co-author and an astronomer
at Chalmers University of Technology and
Northwestern University, via 'Newsweek'.
Now that we know what to look for,
the next step is to find out how
common a phenomenon this is.
And if this is a stage which all
galaxies with supermassive
black holes go through,
what happens to them next?, Mark Gorski, study co-author and an astronomer
at Chalmers University of Technology and
Northwestern University, via 'Newsweek'
Credit: Wibbitz Top Stories Duration: 01:31Published
Scientists Use 'Dyson Sphere' , Signature to Search for , Potential Alien Life.
Decades ago, physicist Freeman Dyson theorized that a
shell made of solar panels that surrounds a star would be
the ultimate energy solution for an advanced civilization. .
One should expect that, within a few
thousand years of its entering the stage
of industrial development, any intelligent
species should be found occupying an
artificial biosphere which completely
surrounds its parent star, Freeman Dyson, 1960 paper, via CNN.
CNN reports that the concept took
hold and the hypothetical megastructures
have come to be called Dyson spheres. .
At the time, Dyson suggested that
these spheres would emit waste heat
as detectable infrared radiation.
The British American physicist suggested
that this unique radiation signature could
be a way of finding extraterrestrial life. .
It would be much more
rewarding to search directly
for intelligence, but technology
is the only thing we have
any chance of seeing, Matías Suazo, Lead study author and a doctoral student
in the department of physics and astronomy
of Uppsala University in Sweden, via CNN.
A new study searched five million stars in the Milky Way
galaxy to find seven candidates that could potentially
be home to an advanced civilization's Dyson sphere.
It’s difficult for us to find
an explanation for these sources,
because we don’t have enough
data to prove what is the real
cause of the infrared glow, Matías Suazo, Lead study author and a doctoral student in
the department of physics and astronomy of
Uppsala University in Sweden, via CNN.
It’s difficult for us to find
an explanation for these sources,
because we don’t have enough
data to prove what is the real
cause of the infrared glow, Matías Suazo, Lead study author and a doctoral student in
the department of physics and astronomy of
Uppsala University in Sweden, via CNN.
They could be Dyson spheres,
because they behave like our
models predict, but they could
be something else as well, Matías Suazo, Lead study author and a doctoral student
in the department of physics and astronomy
of Uppsala University in Sweden, via CNN.
The team's findings were published
in the journal 'Monthly Notices of
the Royal Astronomical Society.'
Credit: Wibbitz Top Stories Duration: 01:31Published
NOAA Issues Rare , Warning Following Powerful , Solar Event.
CBS reports that a severe G4 geomagnetic storm
headed towards Earth has triggered a rare warning
from NOAA officials for the first time in two decades.
The warning comes following days of solar activity
that sent several waves of plasma in Earth's
direction along with powerful magnetic fields.
G4 storms are the second-strongest
type of geomagnetic storms and can
cause widespread voltage problems. .
NOAA warns that they can also cause some
protective assets to "trip out key assets from the grid,"
as well as cause orientation problems for spacecraft. .
If geomagnetic storms
were hurricanes, 'severe'
would be category 4. , Spaceweather.com, via CBS.
The powerful G4 storm could also cause
northern lights, or aurora borealis, to be seen
in northern California and as far south as Alabama.
In a May 9 press release, NOAA said that the solar
event began on May 8, when a group of sunspots
generated "several moderate to strong solar flares.".
According to NASA, solar flares are explosions of
radiation which are considered the strongest
explosive events in the solar system.
NOAA noted that the area, which
produced the recent flares, is roughly
16 times the diameter of the Earth.
The sunspots known as AR3664 measures about 124,000
miles across, and Space.com notes that it is one of the, "largest and most active
sunspots seen this solar cycle." .
According to NOAA, the geomagnetic storm
is expected to hit Earth as early as midday
on May 10 and continue through May 12
Credit: Wibbitz Top Stories Duration: 01:31Published
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