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Astronomical Mystery:
Tremendous Explosion And Appearance Of Odd Rings

2 March, 2012

MessageToEagle.com - Twenty five years ago, on 1987 February 23, the brightest supernova of modern times was observed in the Large Magellanic Cloud.

The collision occurred at speeds near 60 million kilometers per hour and shock-heats the ring material causing it to glow.

Over time, astronomers have watched and waited for the expanding debris from this tremendous stellar explosion to crash into previously expelled material.

A clear result of such a collision is demonstrated in the time lapse video of images recorded by the Hubble Space Telescope between 1994 and 2009.

Shocked by Supernova 1987A Image Credit: Hubble Space Telescope, NASA, ESA; Video compilation: Mark McDonald

The Mysterious Rings of Supernova 1987A. Image Credit: ESA/Hubble, NASA

The movie depicts the collision of an outward moving blast wave with the pre-existing, light-year wide ring.

Astronomers continue to study the collision as it illuminates the interesting past of SN 1987A.

What's causing those odd rings in supernova 1987A?

The origin and the nature of the beautiful circumstellar rings are still a mystery.

They have been measured to expand rather slowly, "only" 70,000-100,000 miles per hour (this is considered slow because the supernova material in the center is expanding outward at speeds that are 100-2000 times higher!).

Spectroscopic observations show that the rings are enriched in the element nitrogen.

Both the slow speeds and the unusual composition show that the rings were expelled from the progenitor star when it was a red supergiant, more than 20,000 years before that star exploded as a supernova.

Speculation into the cause of the rings includes beamed jets emanating from an otherwise hidden neutron star left over from the supernova, and the interaction of the wind from the progenitor star with gas released before the explosion.

See also:
Astronomical Mystery: Giant Alien Planet Orbiting Three Suns

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