# Archiv: Galaxien / galaxies

25.10.2021 - 19:22 [ arxiv.org ]

# A Unified Model for the Fan Region and the North Polar Spur: A bundle of filaments in the Local Galaxy

We present a simple, unified model that can explain two of the brightest, large-scale, diffuse, polarizedradio features in the sky, the North Polar Spur (NPS) and the Fan Region, along with several otherprominent loops. We suggest that they are long, magnetized, and parallel filamentary structures thatsurround the Local arm and/or Local Bubble, in which the Sun is embedded. We show this modelis consistent with the large number of observational studies on these regions, and is able to resolvean apparent contradiction in the literature that suggests the high latitude portion of the NPS isnearby, while lower latitude portions are more distant. Understanding the contributions of this localemission is critical to developing a complete model of the Galactic magnetic field.

25.10.2021 - 19:18 [ Dunlap Institute for Astronomy & Astrophysics, University of Toronto ]

# Dunlap Astronomer discovers we may be surrounded by tunnel-like structure

(Oct.14, 2021)

Dr. Jennifer West, Research Associate at the Dunlap Institute for Astronomy and Astrophysics, is making a scientific case that two bright structures that are seen on opposite sides of the sky – previously considered to be separate – are actually connected and are made of rope-like filaments. This connection forms what looks like a tunnel around our solar system.

“If we were to look up in the sky,” explains West, “we would see this tunnel-like structure in just about every direction we looked – that is, if we had eyes that could see radio light.”

22.09.2021 - 19:40 [ ORF ]

# Riesiger Hohlraum im All entdeckt

Bei der Erstellung dreidimensionaler Karten in der Milchstraße haben Astrophysiker und Astrophysikerinnen einen riesigen Hohlraum entdeckt. Das kugelförmige Gebilde hat einen Durchmesser von rund 500 Lichtjahren.

07.04.2021 - 21:33 [ France24 ]

# Radio telescope reveals thousands of star-forming galaxies in early Universe

The LOFAR telescope combines signals from a huge network of more than 70,000 individual antennas in countries from Ireland to Poland, linked by a high-speed fiber optic network.

20.02.2021 - 12:20 [ Jet Propulsion Laboratory / NASA.gov ]

# Using Light to Study Planets

In this activity, students will build a spectrometer using basic materials to observe the light emitted and absorbed by several sources. This will be used as a model for how NASA uses spectroscopy to determine the nature of elements found on Earth and other planets. For higher grades, this activity can also be used to discuss advanced spectroscopic topics, such as how NASA research is advancing spectroscopic techniques to teach us more about plant life on Earth.

04.11.2020 - 18:31 [ MIT Technology Review ]

# We just found a source for one of the most mysterious phenomena in astronomy

Spoiler alert: it’s not aliens. Two new studies published in Nature today strongly suggest that magnetars—highly magnetized neutron stars—are one source of FRBs. The studies also indicate that these bursts are probably much more common than we imagined.

15.09.2020 - 20:05 [ Informationsdienst Wissenschaft ]

# P-ONE: Neues Observatorium im Pazifik für hochenergetische kosmische Neutrinos

Astronomen beobachten das Licht, das von entfernten Himmelsobjekten zu uns kommt, um das Universum zu erkunden. Licht verrät jedoch nichts über hochenergetische Ereignisse außerhalb unserer Galaxie, wie etwa über die Jets aktiver galaktischer Kerne, Gammastrahlenausbrüche oder Supernovae. Denn auf ihrem langen Weg durch das Universum verlieren Photonen mit extrem hohen Energien einen Teil ihrer Energie durch Interaktion mit anderen Teilchen.

20.07.2020 - 13:25 [ Sloan Digital Sky Survey - SDSS.org ]

# No need to Mind the Gap: Astrophysicists fill in 11 billion years of our universe’s expansion history

This map represents the combined effort of more than 20 years of mapping the Universe using the Sloan Foundation telescope. The cosmic history that has been revealed in this map shows that about six billion years ago, the expansion of the Universe began to accelerate, and has continued to get faster and faster ever since. This accelerated expansion seems to be due to a mysterious invisible component of the Universe called “dark energy,” consistent with Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity but extremely difficult to reconcile with our current understanding of particle physics.

20.07.2020 - 13:20 [ Blick.ch ]

# Millionen Galaxien und Quasare analysiert: Forschende schaffen bisher grösste 3D-Karte des Universums

Im Projekt forschte das Team bis zu elf Milliarden Jahre zurück in die Vergangenheit. Dazu benutzten sie sogenannte Quasare – der aktive Kern einer Galaxie, deren supermassenreiches Schwarzes Loch in ihrem Zentrum durch die darin eingeschlossene Materie extrem hell wird.

Die Karte zeigt, dass sich die Expansion des Universums an einem bestimmten Punkt beschleunigt hat und seither anhält. Die Forschenden machen dafür dunkle Energie verantwortlich.

15.07.2020 - 16:55 [ Johan Hidding / Youtube ]

# Large scale structure formation in the Universe simulated

Apr 2, 2009

This is a simulation of structure formation in the Universe using the adhesion approximation. The algorithm is described by Weinberg and Gunn in MNRAS in 1990

15.07.2020 - 16:54 [ Youtube ]

# The Cosmic Web, or: What does the universe look like at a VERY large scale?

Nov 6, 2010

The Millennium Simulation featured in this clip was run in 2005 by the Virgo Consortium, an international group of astrophysicists from Germany, the United Kingdom, Canada, Japan and the United States.

15.07.2020 - 16:52 [ Vice.com ]

# Scientists Discovered a Gigantic Structure in a Hidden Zone of Space

(today)

However, this particular structure is located in the “Zone of Avoidance,” which is the region of space right behind the dusty center of the Milky Way from our perspective on Earth. As a result, our galaxy’s bulk has blocked it from view—until now.

16.04.2020 - 03:18 [ Nature Astronomy ]

# An extremely energetic supernova from a very massive star in a dense medium

Here we present a new event, SN2016aps, offset from the centre of a low-mass galaxy, that radiated ≳5 × 1051 erg, necessitating a hyper-energetic supernova explosion.

22.01.2020 - 22:02 [ Dr. Jessie Christiansen ‏/ Twitter ]

# I have always been interested in galactic archaeology, but I don’t think this is what they meant. Did you know that dinosaurs lived on the other side of the Galaxy?

(28.08.2019)

02.01.2020 - 16:57 [ Dr. Jessie Christiansen ‏/ Twitter ]

# I have always been interested in galactic archaeology, but I don’t think this is what they meant. Did you know that dinosaurs lived on the other side of the Galaxy?

(28.08.2019)

15.11.2019 - 18:07 [ Tuan Do, Astronomer at UCLA ‏/ Twitter ]

# Here’s a timelapse of images over 2.5 hr from May from @keckobservatory of the supermassive black hole Sgr A*. The black hole is always variable, but this was the brightest we’ve seen in the infrared so far. It was probably even brighter before we started observing that night!

15.11.2019 - 18:04 [ arxiv.org ]

# Unprecedented variability of Sgr A* in NIR

(05.08.2019)

The electromagnetic counterpart to the Galactic center supermassive black hole, Sgr A*, has been observed in the near-infrared for over 20 years and is known to be highly variable. We report new Keck Telescope observations showing that Sgr A* reached much brighter flux levels in 2019 than ever measured at near-infrared wavelengths. In the K$^\prime$ band, Sgr A* reached flux levels of $\sim6$ mJy, twice the level of the previously observed peak flux from $>13,000$ measurements over 130 nights with the VLT and Keck Telescopes. We also observe a factor of 75 change in flux over a 2-hour time span with no obvious color changes between 1.6 $\mu$m and 2.1 $\mu$m.

15.11.2019 - 18:00 [ universetoday.com ]

# Milky Way’s Black Hole Just Flared, Growing 75 Times as Bright for a Few Hours

(13.08.2019)

Even though the black hole at the center of the Milky Way is a monster, it’s still rather quiet. Called Sagittarius A*, it’s about 4.6 million times more massive than our Sun. Usually, it’s a brooding behemoth. But scientists observing Sgr. A* with the Keck Telescope just watched as its brightness bloomed to over 75 times normal for a few hours.

15.11.2019 - 17:58 [ Space.com ]

# Something Weird Is Happening to the Black Hole at the Center of the Milky Way

(15.08.2019)

Astronomers have been watching the black hole at the center of our galaxy for 20 years, and in May, they saw something they’d never seen before.

15.11.2019 - 17:47 [ arxiv.org ]

# The large-scale ionization cones in the Galaxy

(05.10.2019)

Our time-dependent Seyfert flare models adequately explain the observations and indicate the Seyfert flare event took place T_o = 3.5 +/- 1 Myr ago.

15.11.2019 - 17:32 [ ScienceAlert.com ]

# Something in The Centre of Our Galaxy Colossally Erupted 3.5 Million Years Ago

(06.10.2019)

In 2013, astrophysicist Joss Bland-Hawthorn of the University of Sydney and the ARC Centre of Excellence for All Sky Astrophysics in 3 Dimensions (ASTRO 3D) and colleagues estimated that the event occurred between 1 and 3 million years ago.

Now, more observations taken using the Hubble Space Telescope – and therefore a bigger dataset – have provided even more compelling evidence for the event. And the team has been able to narrow down a timeframe for both when the event occurred, as well as its duration.

15.11.2019 - 17:29 [ arxiv.org ]

# Fossil imprint of a powerful flare at the Galactic Centre along the Magellanic Stream

(21.09.2013)

Thus it is likely that the Stream emission arose from a `Seyfert flare‘ that was active 1-3 Myr ago, consistent with the cosmic ray lifetime in the Fermi bubbles. Sgr A* activity today is greatly suppressed (70-80 dB) relative to the Seyfert outburst…

15.11.2019 - 17:16 [ Forbes ]

# The Milky Way’s Supermassive Black Hole Erupted Two Million Years Ago

(25.09.2013)

The key the astronomers found was actually discovered 20 years old, in the form of a strange glow that astronomers had noticed in the Magellanic Stream. The Magellanic Stream is composed of large clouds of gas – mostly hydrogen – that stretch for light years in the wake of the Milky Way’s two companion Galaxies, the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds. The Stream is about 2 billion years old.

„We didn’t understand the cause. Then suddenly we realised it must be the mark, the fossil record, of a huge outburst of energy from the centre of our Galaxy,“ remarked researcher Joss Bland-Hawthorn in a press release.

15.11.2019 - 15:49 [ European Southern Observatory (ESO) / Youtube ]

# Zooming into Sagittarius A*

(07.11.2018)

ESO’s exquisitely sensitive GRAVITY instrument has added further evidence to the long-standing assumption that a supermassive black hole lurks in the centre of the Milky Way. New observations show clumps of gas swirling around at about 30% of the speed of light on a circular orbit just outside a four million solar mass black hole — the first time material has been observed orbiting close to the point of no return, and the most detailed observations yet of material orbiting this close to a black hole.

15.11.2019 - 15:31 [ Carnegie Science / Youtube ]

# Hypervelocity star

(12.11.2019)

The artist impression of the ejection mechanism by the supermassive black hole. Credit: James Josephides (Swinburne Astronomy Productions)

15.11.2019 - 15:21 [ Carnegie Science ]

# Runaway star was ejected from the “heart of darkness”

“My favorite part of this discovery is thinking about where this star came from and where it’s going,” said Ji. “It was born in one of the craziest places in the universe, near a supermassive black hole with lots of other nearby star friends; but it’s going to leave our galaxy and die all alone, out in the middle of nowhere. Quite a fall from grace.”

15.11.2019 - 15:06 [ CBS News ]

# Supermassive black hole throws star out of Milky Way galaxy at speed of 3.7 million mph

Five million years ago, when humanity’s ancestors were just learning to walk upright, a star was ejected from Sagittarius A*, the supermassive black hole at the center of the Milky Way Galaxy, at a staggering 3.7 million mph. This month, a group of researchers spotted the superfast star traveling relatively close to Earth.

15.11.2019 - 15:00 [ businessinsider.fr ]

# A NASA scientist’s incredible animation shows how dinosaurs roamed the Earth on the other side of the Milky Way galaxy

Our sun orbits the galaxy’s center, so many dinosaurs roamed the Earth while the planet was on the other side of the Milky Way.

Our solar system’s orbit keeps us just the right distance from the galaxy’s chaotic center for life to exist.

15.11.2019 - 12:27 [ Dr. Jessie Christiansen ‏/ Twitter ]

# I have always been interested in galactic archaeology, but I don’t think this is what they meant. Did you know that dinosaurs lived on the other side of the Galaxy?

30.05.2019 - 16:24 [ scitecheuropa.eu ]

# Solving a century-long mystery: the origin of galactic cosmic rays

(04.04.2019)

The word ‘astronomy’ means the direct observations of extra-terrestrial objects. This definition is relevant to photons, neutrinos, and gravitational waves, i.e. massless, neutral and stable particles. But for cosmic ray electrons, protons, and nuclei, the term ‘astronomy’ is used with a certain reservation. Because of the deflections of electrically charged particles in the chaotic interstellar and intergalactic magnetic fields, the information about their original directions pointing to the sites of their production is lost. Instead, on the Earth, we detect an (almost) isotropic flux of cosmic rays contributed by a huge number of galactic and extragalactic sources.

30.05.2019 - 16:11 [ arxiv.org ]

# Hypothesis: Muon Radiation Dose and Marine Megafaunal Extinction at the end-Pliocene Supernova

(November 2018)

Considerable data and analysis support the detection of one or more supernovae (SNe) at a distance of about 50 pc, ∼2.6 million years ago. This is possibly related to the extinction event around that time and is a member of a series of explosions that formed the Local Bubble in the interstellar medium. We build on previous work, and propagate the muon flux from SN-initiated cosmic rays from the surface to the depths of the ocean. We find that the radiation dose from the muons will exceed the total present surface dose from all sources at depths up to 1 km and will persist for at least the lifetime of marine megafauna. It is reasonable to hypothesize that this increase in radiation load may have contributed to a newly documented marine megafaunal extinction at that time.

30.05.2019 - 15:55 [ New York Times ]

# STUDY HINTS EXTINCTIONS STRIKE IN SET INTERVALS

(11. Dezember 1983)

At a conference on mass extinctions, held in August at Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff, Dr. Sepkoski said the timing of these events suggested that “there is indeed a statistically significant periodicity in the observed distribution of events of mass or accelerated extinction over the last 250 million years.“ Search for Answers

He confessed this “stumped“ him and Dr. Raup, saying: “We are aware of no documented process with a cycling time approximately 26 million years. But with that long a cycle, we suspect that the forcing agent will not be terrestrial but rather solar or galactic.“

30.05.2019 - 15:49 [ Harvard.edu ]

# Cosmic-ray volleys from the Galactic Center and their recent impact on the earth environment

Authors: Laviolette, P. A.
Journal: Earth, Moon, and Planets (ISSN 0167-9295), vol. 37, March 1987, p. 241-286.

14.07.2018 - 16:25 [ New York Times ]

# It Came From a Black Hole, and Landed in Antarctica

For the first time, astronomers followed cosmic neutrinos into the fire-spitting heart of a supermassive blazar.

14.07.2018 - 16:24 [ TUMuenchen1 / Youtube ]

# IceCube Neutrino Telescope Detects Origin of Extragalactic Particles

For the first time ever, scientists have determined the cosmic origin of highest-energy neutrinos. A research group led by IceCube scientist Elisa Resconi, spokesperson of the Collaborative Research Center SFB1258 at the Technical University of Munich (TUM), provides an important piece of evidence that the particles detected by the IceCube neutrino telescope at the South Pole originate from a galaxy four billion light-years away from Earth.

14.07.2018 - 15:41 [ IceCube Neutrino Observatory at Amundsen–Scott South Pole Station ]

# IceCube neutrinos point to long-sought cosmic ray accelerator

An international team of scientists has found the first evidence of a source of high-energy cosmic neutrinos, ghostly subatomic particles that can travel unhindered for billions of light years from the most extreme environments in the universe to Earth.

The observations, made by the IceCube Neutrino Observatory at the Amundsen–Scott South Pole Station and confirmed by telescopes around the globe and in Earth’s orbit, help resolve a more than a century-old riddle about what sends subatomic particles such as neutrinos and cosmic rays speeding through the universe.

14.07.2018 - 15:32 [ zlotonews.com/ ]

# Scientists capture mysterious ‘ghost particle’ in a giant ice cube in ‘triumph’ that changes how we see the universe

Scientists have captured a ghost-like subatomic particle on Earth, helping to solve a mystery baffling scientists for 100 years.

The so-called “ghost particle” was trapped by researchers in a giant ice cube at the South Pole.

It’s actually a high-energy neutrino, and is the first of its type ever detected by scientists.

Importantly, researchers believe they’ve tracked its likely source: a supermassive black hole that emits light and cosmic rays.

04.06.2018 - 17:21 [ University of Cambridge ]

# Gaia creates richest star map of our Galaxy – and beyond

The European Space Agency’s Gaia mission has produced the richest star catalogue to date, including high-precision measurements of nearly 1.7 billion stars and revealing previously unseen details of our home Galaxy.