Space History

There is evidence that water was brought to Earth by meteorites

The space rock, called the Winchcomb meteorite, has been closely studied by researchers who have found that it contains water similar to the water on our planet. Scientists focus on the dominant theory that the Earth received its huge supply of water thanks to asteroids that intensively bombarded its surface in the distant past.

During the study of the “space guest”, it was found that Winchcomb includes about 2% carbon and 11% water. This water, according to the researchers, is almost indistinguishable from Earth’s water by the ratio of different types of hydrogen atoms.

In addition, extraterrestrial amino acids were found in the meteorite, which are a “starter kit” for the building blocks of life. This suggests that meteorites could deliver to Earth not only water, but also organic materials, which eventually turned this planet into a living world.

Astronomers have found the bare core of a massive star for the first time

The star lost its outer shell less than a few thousand years ago.

Astronomers have determined that the Gamma Dove star in the Milky Way is not an ordinary star, but a unique object — the bare core of a massive star that lost its outer shell several thousand years ago due to interactions with a low-mass companion star. This is the first discovery of its kind.

Gamma Pigeon is a very rare object, since the phase of restructuring of the naked core into a hot white dwarf takes no more than 10 thousand years, which is only one thousandth of the total lifetime of a massive star. The ejection of the outer shell of the star could have occurred less than a few thousand years ago. It is expected that the Gamma of the Pigeon will become a target for future detailed studies, both spectroscopic and astroseismological.

Astronomers have discovered a cataclysmic variable

Astronomers have discovered a cataclysmic variable with the shortest period of rotation among the currently known systems of this type

The stellar duo consists of a white dwarf and a sun-like star that make one revolution around each other in just 51 minutes!

The ZTFJ 1813+4251 system was screened out of more than a billion stars observed as part of the Zwicky Transient Facility survey, and then studied in detail using the Keck Observatory telescope. The collected data allowed modeling of the present and future object.

The white dwarf in the ZTF J1813+4251 system is 100 times smaller than the Sun and twice as “lighter” than it. The Companion is 10 times inferior to the Sun in both parameters.

Astronomers have created a new interactive map of the universe

The new map of the Universe for the first time displays the coverage of the entire known cosmos with extreme accuracy.

Created by astronomers at Johns Hopkins University based on data collected over two decades using the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, the map provides an opportunity to get acquainted with data previously available only to scientists.

“As a child, I was very inspired by astronomical images, stars, nebulae and galaxies, and now it’s our time to create a new type of images to inspire people,” says the creator of the map, Bryce Menard. “Astrophysicists around the world have been analyzing this data for many years, which has led to thousands of scientific papers and discoveries. But no one has taken the time to create a beautiful, scientifically accurate and accessible map for people who are not scientists. Our goal here is to show everyone what the universe really looks like.”

“James Webb” got a picture of a nascent star

It is at the earliest stage of star formation and gives an idea of what the Sun and the Solar System looked like in infancy

The James Webb Space Telescope has received an incredibly detailed image of object L1527, which, according to astronomers, is formed by a forming star. Its age is estimated at only one hundred thousand years.

“The protostar is hidden in the “neck” of the hourglass, and its protoplanetary disk, comparable in size to the Solar System, is visible as a horizontal dark line. The light from the protostar seeps above and below this plane, illuminating the cavities in the gas and dust surrounding the region,” the participants of the observations note.

Protostar L1527 has a long way to go before becoming a full-fledged star. So far, it does not generate its own energy due to the nuclear fusion of hydrogen, and its spherical shape is still unstable. At the moment, L1527 looks like a hot, plump cluster of gas with a mass of 20-40 percent solar.

The dimming of Betelgeuse could be caused by a black hole

When the Betelgeuse star began to fade rapidly in 2019, many thought that it would soon flare up as a supernova. However, over time, its luminosity recovered, and scientists began to think about the cause of this phenomenon. Now there is a theory that it was caused by a black hole that passed near the star.

It was with her that astronomers tried to explain the dimming of Betelgeuse. They created a computer model of this process, but it showed that from such a passage, the deformation of the star’s atmosphere would be too weak to lead to a 60 percent drop in brightness.

However, scientists have suggested that the black hole could cause other effects on the surface of the giant star. For example, an explosion could occur on it, and together with tidal inflation, this could really cause a grandiose dimming.

Capstone has reached lunar orbit

The Capstone spacecraft reached the lunar orbit on Sunday, where it will spend at least six months. This is reported on the NASA website.

The tasks of the device include the calculation of the orbit for the future Gateway lunar station. Its mass is about 25 kg.

NASA announced in the spring of 2019 that the astronaut landing program on the Moon, called Artemis, includes three stages. The first is the launch into space of the Orion spacecraft using the new Space Launch System launch vehicle, which in unpiloted mode will make several orbits around the Moon and return to Earth. The second is a flyby of a natural satellite of the Earth already with a crew on board, which is planned for 2023. At the third stage in 2025, NASA expects to deliver astronauts to the Moon, and then send them to Mars in the mid-2030s.

Spiral Galaxy ESO 137-001

Here is an atypical spiral galaxy with a jumper (an elongated structure of stars and gas in the galactic disk), which looks like a dandelion seed head caught up by the wind. In addition, ESO 137-001 behaves accordingly, spreading its “seeds” in space.
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The galaxy is moving at a speed of about seven million kilometers per hour, which leads to a rapid loss of gas — gas and dust clouds literally break away from it. Extreme conditions trigger star formation, and massive and extremely hot stars appear, which in the image look like blue dots forming bright “streams” at the base of ESO 137-001.
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The image attached to the post was created based on data obtained by the NASA/ESA Hubble space Telescope and the NASA Space Observatory “Chandra”.

We start Monday with a snapshot of the week from Hubble

The Multiverse

A multiverse is a hypothetical set of all possible real—life parallel universes.

According to the hypothesis, the universe in which we live may not be the only one that exists. In fact, there are an infinite number of universes, and they are all combined into a multiverse

This concept may seem a little crazy, but if it is true, then there is an alternative world exactly like the one we live in. Despite the fact that physicists claim that the multiverse is just a fiction, some scientists are trying to prove it. Even Stephen Hawking tried to solve her paradox.