Tomasz Nowakowski is a member of the physics.org community.
Astronomers used NASA's Chandra X-ray observatory to study a remnant of a supernova. Information about the expansion of this structure can be found in the results of the research.
A supernova explosion results in diffuse structures. They contain ejected material expanding from the explosion and other material that has been swept up.
Analyzing the remnants of supernovas is important for astronomy as they play a key role in the evolution of the universe and provide the energy needed for heating up the interstellar medium. The acceleration of Cosmic rays is thought to be caused by SNRs.
As part of an X-ray survey using the Einstein observatory, a remnant of a Type Ia supernova was found. The SNR has an age of over 300 years and is expanding into a low density environment with an average speed of over 7,000 km/s.
The expansion process of SNR 0509-6 7.5 was further investigated by a team of astronomer. They looked at the motion data collected in 2020 with Chandra.
A new epoch of Chandra observations was acquired between April 11 and November 21 of 2020 and spread over 14 individual segments ranging in length from 25 to 40 ks.
Guest's team used radial profiles along six regions to measure the diameter of the remnant. The new data was compared to the previous data.
An average expansion speed of 6,120 km/s was achieved by the measured change in the diameter of SNR 0509-6 7.5. The true age of the remnant is even lower due to the fact that this is an undecelerated age of about 600 years.
The true age is somewhat lower than the undecelerated free expansion age. The results of the simulations used to calculate the age of 310 years are in line with the results of us.
The method used by the researchers doesn't allow them to determine if one area is expanding more quickly than the other. In order to verify this, further observations of this remnant need to be made using the Hubble Space Telescope and Chandra at X-ray wavelengths.
More information: Benson T. Guest et al, An X-ray Proper Motion Study of the LMC SNR 0509-67.5. arXiv:2210.02525v1 [astro-ph.HE], arxiv.org/abs/2210.02525There is a science network.
All Rights Reserved © 2024
