--------- #1319 - The Supernova of 185 A.D.
- Attachment: RCW-86 Supernova ( See footnote (1))
- See attached image of RCW-86 Supernova. This is one of about 8 supernovae explosions witnessed by the naked eye in recorded history. The Chinese recorded this one in the year 185 A.D. They called it the “Guest Star” and it remained in the night sky for 8 months.
- The image is a composite with the X-ray part of the spectrum translated down to blue and green colors so we can see them. The X-rays are being created in nebula debris by a tremendous shockwave that is expanding and smashing into the interstellar gas heating the atoms up to millions of degrees.
- The infrared part of the spectrum is translated up to yellow and red colors so we can see it too. The infrared radiation comes from dust in the interstellar medium that is also heated but only to 200 degrees below zero. Believe it or not that is warm compared to the background medium that is 270 degrees below zero, and only 3 degrees above Absolute Zero. The Cosmic Microwave Background is at 2.725 degrees Kelvin.
- The Guest Star Supernova explosion occurred 1,826 years ago. Astronomers studying the image today are trying to understand how the explosion occurred. It started with a White Dwarf star that was in a binary system with a companion star. the intense gravity of the densely packed White Dwarf star itself was probably the remnant of an earlier supernova. Its intense gravity is pulling gas and dust off the companion star steadily gaining mass.
- When the White Dwarf star reaches a mass of 1.4 Solar Mass ( 40% greater than the mass of our Sun), it explodes in a thermonuclear explosion. At the intense gravity of 1.4 Solar Mass the electrons in the shells of atoms collapse into the nuclei. The star implodes into the core and rebounds into a giant explosion. Before the explosion occurred the star had emitted smaller burps of material creating a smaller shockwave of wind that cleared out a cavity of very low-density surrounding the binary system.
- When the explosion finally occurred it expanded rapidly into this rarified cavity much faster than it would have in normal Type 1a Supernova explosions. This new finding has important implications for astronomers who use Type 1a Supernovae as “ standard candles” to measure the distances of galaxies throughout the Cosmos.
- RCW-86 is 8,000 lightyears away in the southern Constellation Circinis the Compasses. The explosion nebula today is 85 lightyears in diameter and occupies a spot in the sky that is slightly larger than a full moon. This is 2 to 3 times larger than astronomers would have expected for a supernova of this type having 2,000 years to expand.
- RCW-86 was the first supernova ever recorded. It is still telling us new things. More announcements will be made shortly, stay tuned.
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(1) http://go.nasa.gov/pnv6Oy
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