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posted by hubie on Tuesday August 02 2022, @11:08PM   Printer-friendly
from the shock-and-awe dept.

Arthur T Knackerbracket has processed the following story:

Zeta Ophiuchi is a star with a complicated past, as it was likely ejected from its birthplace by a powerful stellar explosion. A detailed new look by NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory helps tell more of the history of this runaway star.

Located approximately 440 light-years from Earth, Zeta Ophiuchi is a hot star that is about 20 times more massive than the Sun. Evidence that Zeta Ophiuchi was once in close orbit with another star, before being ejected at about 100,000 miles per hour when this companion was destroyed in a supernova explosion over a million years ago has been provided by previous observations.

In fact, previously released infrared data from NASA’s now-retired Spitzer Space Telescope, seen in this new composite image, reveals a spectacular shock wave (red and green) that was formed by matter blowing away from the star’s surface and slamming into gas in its path. A bubble of X-ray emission (blue) located around the star, produced by gas that has been heated by the effects of the shock wave to tens of millions of degrees, is revealed by data from Chandra.

Video of article

Reference: “Thermal emission from bow shocks. II. 3D magnetohydrodynamic models of zeta Ophiuchi” by S. Green, J. Mackey, P. Kavanagh, T. J. Haworth, M. Moutzouri and V. V. Gvaramadze, Accepted, Astronomy and Astrophysics.
DOI: 10.1051/0004-6361/202243531


Original Submission

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  • (Score: 0, Spam) by michaelmas on Tuesday August 02 2022, @11:35PM (2 children)

    by michaelmas (17902) on Tuesday August 02 2022, @11:35PM (#1264698)

    saw zeta Ophi passing aristarchus

    • (Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 03 2022, @12:27AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 03 2022, @12:27AM (#1264702)

      Q: Is passing aristarchus harder than just normal gas from eating too many beans?

    • (Score: 1, Offtopic) by liar on Wednesday August 03 2022, @12:29AM

      by liar (17039) on Wednesday August 03 2022, @12:29AM (#1264704)

      We radiate and dissipate...
      It's Better to Burn Out than Fade Away
      https://youtu.be/nf3RlmCf-IY [youtu.be]

      --
      Noli nothis permittere te terere.
  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by c0lo on Wednesday August 03 2022, @01:09AM (2 children)

    by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday August 03 2022, @01:09AM (#1264711) Journal

    TFA's full title

    Zeta Ophiuchi: Spectacular Shock Wave From Rejected Star Hurtling Through Space at 100,000 Miles per Hour

    Fucken, 100,000mph is 44,704m/s - in astronomical terms, that's not "hurling" it's "barely crawling".

    The escape velocity from the solar system starting from Earth is only about 4 times lower than that - at 11,000m/s. The Solar system orbits the center of the galaxy at 230,000m/s. Heck, the escape velocity of a particle from Sun's surface is 617,500m/s (and yet Sun's coronal mass ejections are a thing).

    --
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
    • (Score: 2) by bzipitidoo on Wednesday August 03 2022, @02:31AM

      by bzipitidoo (4388) on Wednesday August 03 2022, @02:31AM (#1264723) Journal

      I presume they mean 44 km/s above the speed the star would be moving if it was in an ordinary, near circular orbit about the center of the galaxy. Or perhaps that's it's speed relative to us. Yes, they ought to clarify that. From what I read, most near stars differ in speed from us by less than 20 km/s.

      While it's not a hypervelocity star (we know of only about 20 of those), I gather it is moving enough faster to make a bigger than usual bow wave.

    • (Score: 2) by Immerman on Thursday August 04 2022, @05:28PM

      by Immerman (3985) on Thursday August 04 2022, @05:28PM (#1264937)

      A little correction on your escape velocities: 11km/s is only the escape velocity from Earth. It'd let you coast to an infinite distance if there were nothing else in the universe.

      Back in our universe it'll get you into a co-solar orbit with Earth. If you want to escape the sun as well you need more speed, at the distance of the Earth's orbit, solar escape velocity is 42km/s (Ve = sqrt(2GM/r)), though Earth's 30km/s orbital speed will count towards that - so you'd only need an extra 12km/s after escaping Earth (Also I believe you should add escape kinetic energies rather than velocities, so escaping the solar system from Earth's surface doesn't require 11+12=23km/s of speed, but only sqrt(11^2 + 12^2)=16km/s.)

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