The inner part of the supernova is not moving as smoothly as it could. Astronomers from the University of Amsterdam and Harvard discovered this. The remains are thought to have collided with something. Their finding has been accepted for publication.
About 11,000 light years away from us, the remnant of an exploded star is called Cassiopeia A. The first light from the explosion should have reached Earth in 1670. There was too much gas and dust around the star for the explosion to be seen with the naked eye. The Cassiopeia A explosion nebula has a temperature of 30 million degrees Celsius and is expanding at an average rate of 4,000 to 6,000 kilometers per second. The expansion is most likely happening in gas that was blown out by the star. About 16 light years is how long the plant is.
19 years of data.
The data from the Chandra X-ray Observatory was analyzed by the researchers. The American X-ray satellite is in a high elliptical circle around the Earth.
The inner regions of the explosion are not expanding on the western side. The researchers measured the outer shock wave's speed. The shock wave accelerated in the west instead of decelerating as expected.
Jacco Vink says that the backward movement in the west can mean two things. The models of Vink and his colleagues show that a collision is most likely. The computer models predict that after a collision, the shock decreases in speed.
The Italian group.
Vink collaborated with an Italian group that investigated the collision scenario. They think the shock wave hit a shell of gas particles. The shell would have been created when the star blew away the wind of gas particles.
The cooperation between Vink and the Italians was not a surprise. The Italian group got to work on the results that Vink showed at the conference.
A lot of attention has been given to the plant. NASA's new X-ray satellite IXPE published its first image of the exploded star on February 14th. The James Webb Space Telescope will look at the supernova remnants later this year.
More information: Jacco Vink, Daniel J. Patnaude & Daniel Castro, The forward and reverse shock dynamics of Cassiopeia A. arXiv:2201.08911v2 [astro-ph.HE], arxiv.org/abs/2201.08911. Accepted for publication in The Astrophysical Journal Journal information: Astrophysical Journal Citation: Ejection nebula of supernova Cassiopeia A does not expand evenly (2022, March 28) retrieved 28 March 2022 from https://phys.org/news/2022-03-ejection-nebula-supernova-cassiopeia-evenly.html This document is subject to copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purpose of private study or research, no part may be reproduced without the written permission. The content is provided for information purposes only.
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