Starship Asterisk*

ta152h0 wrote:...a really big kaboom like the Big Bang and this star has been traveling ever since, in various forms ?

Ann wrote:

BDanielMayfield wrote:

neufer wrote:And what if it also caused critical mutations to our DNA that led to ...

I respectfully disagree with that speculative suggestion, since I’m personally convinced that our appearance as a species was intentional rather than accidental. That being said, I have no reason to disbelieve that a relatively nearby supernova occurred about 3 MYA, or that it could have had a significant effect upon this planet and the life upon it. I wonder, is there any evidence of paleio-climatic changes or is there any fossil evidence for any changes on the earth around this time?

Bruce

You should probably ask someone else, but I strongly believe that the supernova that sent Zeta Ophiuchi flying happened too far away to really affect the Earth. According to my software, the distance to Zeta Ophiuchi today is 366 ± 8 light-years, clearly suggesting that the distance is not greater than 400 light-years. The other stars of upper Scorpius, however, appear to be typically at least 500 light-years away. It would appear, therefore, that the runaway Zeta Ophiuchi might be approaching us, so that it was farther away than it is now by the time its companion went supernova. Anyway, a distance of about 400 light-years is probably quite safe for a Type II supernova.

On the other hand, I believe that astronomers think that the solar system was born from a gas cloud that had been enriched by elements from a recent supernova. So we are indeed the children of supernovae.

Ann

BDanielMayfield wrote:

neufer wrote:And what if it also caused critical mutations to our DNA that led to ...

I respectfully disagree with that speculative suggestion, since I’m personally convinced that our appearance as a species was intentional rather than accidental. That being said, I have no reason to disbelieve that a relatively nearby supernova occurred about 3 MYA, or that it could have had a significant effect upon this planet and the life upon it. I wonder, is there any evidence of paleio-climatic changes or is there any fossil evidence for any changes on the earth around this time?

Bruce

neufer wrote:And what if it also caused critical mutations to our DNA that led to ...

BDanielMayfield wrote:
That’s a fascinating tidbit that you highlight at the end of your very informative post, neufer. We are made from the dust of the earth, but the dust of the earth was made from star stuff, as Sagan was fond of saying. It seems very possible and perhaps likely that the supernova blast that sent today’s apod star flying upon its runaway path around 3 million years ago is the very one that dusted the earth with enough “star stuff” that it can still be measured today in sediments at the bottom of the seas. If this is the case then it would be very likely that most and maybe all humans alive today have at least a few and maybe even many atoms from this supernova inside our bodies right now. I think this puts today’s apod in a more personal perspective than most, don’t you think?

neufer wrote:

[b][color=#FF0000]The faint pulsar PSR B1929+10 captured by the unrivalled sensitivity of ESAs XMM-Newton orbiting X-ray observatory. It is speeding through space in the direction of the arrow at a speed of 177 kilometres per second. At this speed, the pulsar leaves a trail of X-ray emitting electron plasma stretching across space. Credit: Image: Werner Becker / MPI for Extraterrestrial Physics[/color][/b]

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Boomer12k wrote:
I don't see a supernova remnant anywhere nearby... The other could now be a small dwarf star, or even a black hole and traveling along too close to see maybe, or it just got blown away, and then Zeta Oph would just have "continued on its way". But I don't see an S.R. anywhere nearby, and I suppose it could be obscured by denser dust in another part of the nebulosity.

After ~40,000 years there is not much left of a supernova remnant to observe and we would likely be inside of any remnant this close. One must look rather for pulsars.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zeta_Ophiuchi wrote:
<<ζ Ophiuchi is moving through space with a peculiar velocity of 30 km/s. Based upon the age and direction of motion of this star, it is a member of the Upper Scorpius sub-group of the Scorpius-Centaurus Association of stars that share a common origin and space velocity. Such runaway stars may be ejected by dynamic interactions between three or four stars. However, in this case the star may be a former component of a binary star system in which the more massive primary was destroyed in a Type II supernova explosion. The pulsar PSR B1929+10 may be the leftover remnant of this supernova, as it too was ejected from the association with a velocity vector that fits the scenario.>>

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scorpius-Centaurus_Association wrote:

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<<The Scorpius-Centaurus Association (sometimes called Sco-Cen or Sco OB2) is the nearest OB Association to the Sun. This stellar association is composed of three subgroups (Upper Scorpius, Upper Centaurus-Lupus, and Lower Centaurus-Crux), whose mean distances range from 380 to 470 light years.

Many of the bright stars in the constellations Scorpius, Lupus, Centaurus, and Crux are members of the Sco-Cen association, including Antares (the most massive member of Upper Scorpius), and most of the stars in the Southern Cross. The Sco-Cen OB association appears to be the most pronounced part of a large complex of recent (<20 million years) and ongoing star-formation. The complex contains several star-forming molecular clouds in Sco-Cen's immediate vicinity—the Rho Oph, Pipe Nebula, Barnard 68, Chamaeleon, Lupus, Corona Australis, and Coalsack cloud complexes (all at distances of ~120-200 parsecs), and several less populous, young stellar groups on the periphery of Sco-Cen, including the ~3-5 million-year-old epsilon Cha group, ~7 million-year-old eta Chamaeleontis cluster (also called Mamajek 1), ~8 million-year-old TW Hydrae association, ~12 million-year-old Beta Pictoris moving group, and possibly the ~30-50 million-year-old IC 2602 open cluster.

The stellar members of the Sco-Cen association have convergent proper motions of approximately 0.02-0.04 arcseconds per year, indicative that the stars have nearly parallel velocity vectors, moving at about 20 km/s with respect to the Sun. The dispersion of the velocities within the subgroups are only of order 1–2 km/s, and the group is most likely gravitationally unbound. Several supernovae have exploded in Sco-Cen over the past 15 million years, leaving a network of expanding gas superbubbles around the group, including the Loop I Bubble. To explain the presence of radioactive ⁶⁰Fe in deep ocean ferromanganese crusts, it has been hypothesized that a nearby supernova, possibly a member of Sco-Cen, exploded in the Sun's vicinity roughly 3 million years ago.>>

Boomer12k wrote:I don't see a supernova remnant anywhere nearby. But maybe it is too faint now.

I am thinking that if a larger companion exploded, then THIS would become the more massive, and the companion would now be dragged along with Zeta Oph.

Boomer12k wrote:
I don't see a supernova remnant anywhere nearby... The other could now be a small dwarf star, or even a black hole and traveling along too close to see maybe, or it just got blown away, and then Zeta Oph would just have "continued on its way". But I don't see an S.R. anywhere nearby, and I suppose it could be obscured by denser dust in another part of the nebulosity.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zeta_Ophiuchi wrote:
<<ζ Ophiuchi is moving through space with a peculiar velocity of 30 km/s. Based upon the age and direction of motion of this star, it is a member of the Upper Scorpius sub-group of the Scorpius-Centaurus Association of stars that share a common origin and space velocity. Such runaway stars may be ejected by dynamic interactions between three or four stars. However, in this case the star may be a former component of a binary star system in which the more massive primary was destroyed in a Type II supernova explosion. The pulsar PSR B1929+10 may be the leftover remnant of this supernova, as it too was ejected from the association with a velocity vector that fits the scenario.>>

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scorpius-Centaurus_Association wrote:

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<<The Scorpius-Centaurus Association (sometimes called Sco-Cen or Sco OB2) is the nearest OB Association to the Sun. This stellar association is composed of three subgroups (Upper Scorpius, Upper Centaurus-Lupus, and Lower Centaurus-Crux), whose mean distances range from 380 to 470 light years.

Many of the bright stars in the constellations Scorpius, Lupus, Centaurus, and Crux are members of the Sco-Cen association, including Antares (the most massive member of Upper Scorpius), and most of the stars in the Southern Cross. The Sco-Cen OB association appears to be the most pronounced part of a large complex of recent (<20 million years) and ongoing star-formation. The complex contains several star-forming molecular clouds in Sco-Cen's immediate vicinity—the Rho Oph, Pipe Nebula, Barnard 68, Chamaeleon, Lupus, Corona Australis, and Coalsack cloud complexes (all at distances of ~120-200 parsecs), and several less populous, young stellar groups on the periphery of Sco-Cen, including the ~3-5 million-year-old epsilon Cha group, ~7 million-year-old eta Chamaeleontis cluster (also called Mamajek 1), ~8 million-year-old TW Hydrae association, ~12 million-year-old Beta Pictoris moving group, and possibly the ~30-50 million-year-old IC 2602 open cluster.

The stellar members of the Sco-Cen association have convergent proper motions of approximately 0.02-0.04 arcseconds per year, indicative that the stars have nearly parallel velocity vectors, moving at about 20 km/s with respect to the Sun. The dispersion of the velocities within the subgroups are only of order 1–2 km/s, and the group is most likely gravitationally unbound. Several supernovae have exploded in Sco-Cen over the past 15 million years, leaving a network of expanding gas superbubbles around the group, including the Loop I Bubble. To explain the presence of radioactive ⁶⁰Fe in deep ocean ferromanganese crusts, it has been hypothesized that a nearby supernova, possibly a member of Sco-Cen, exploded in the Sun's vicinity roughly 3 million years ago.>>

rr_carroll wrote:

Boomer12k wrote:I don't see a supernova remnant anywhere nearby. But maybe it is too faint now. I am thinking that if a larger companion exploded, then THIS would become the more massive, and the companion would now be dragged along with Zeta Oph. It would not have been "Flung" out of the system. It would just become the dominant mass of the system. The other could now be a small dwarf star, or even a black hole and traveling along too close to see maybe, or it just got blown away, and then Zeta Oph would just have "continued on its way". But I don't see an S.R. anywhere nearby, and I suppose it could be obscured by denser dust in another part of the nebulosity...

I was thinking along the same lines as Boomer12k - follow Zeta Oph's track backward and see if it passes near a supernova remnant. When I followed the links in the story, this seems to have been done for some runaway stars. But links to supernova info say that the supernova explosion can be assymetrical, so the SNR could recoil from the blast. I suppose it could gain a new velocity of unknown speed and direction. Still, it might be possible to find an SNR that's consistent with Zeta Oph's speed, distance and timing. I assume the companion SNR would have been mentioned if it were known.

Let's see, the last link in the story implies that Zeta Oph is about 4 million years old. At 24 km./sec. X 31 million sec/yr. X 4,000,000 yr. = about 3 X 10 to the 15th power kilometers moved since the explosion. So Zeta Oph has moved (3 X 10 to 15th km.) X (9.5 trillion km./light-year) = 316 light-years since the explosion. Since it's 460 l.y. away, it's moved about arctan(316/460) = 34 degrees across the sky, unless my math is wrong. Assuming the remnant's speed is the same or less, you'd have a circle of sky to search that's 68 degrees across. At least, it's within a thousand l.y. from us, which is pretty close.

Boomer12k, unless you have a very large telescope, I presume you did not "see" a consistent supernova remnant in a list of them. I'm curious to know what that list is.

This leads to 2 questions: (1) How big will the blast be when Zeta Oph pops off? Or equivallently, what percentage of it’s mass will be converted into energy? (2) How far away from the Earth will this star be in 4 milion years?

The windy WR star probably started with somewhere around 40 solar masses and has now stripped itself down by an unknown amount, perhaps to under 10.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SN_1987A wrote:
It is of note that the supernova of the blue giant Sanduleak -69° 202 was about one-tenth as luminous as the average observed type II supernova, which is associated with the denser makeup of the star

BDanielMayfield wrote:

CMatisse wrote:
Since it is moving so fast, does this mean it is in a different position every night?

No CMatisse. Since it’s so far away it, like almost all other stars takes an extremely long time (in human terms) to change apparent position relative to other stars. Wikipedia lists it’s proper motions as +15.26 and +24.79 mas/yr in RA and Dec respectively, with mas meaning minute arc seconds. A minute arc second is only 1/3600th of 1 degree, and 1 degree is only 1/180th of the distance across the entire sky.

rr_carroll wrote:

Boomer12k wrote:I don't see a supernova remnant anywhere nearby. But maybe it is too faint now. I am thinking that if a larger companion exploded, then THIS would become the more massive, and the companion would now be dragged along with Zeta Oph. It would not have been "Flung" out of the system. It would just become the dominant mass of the system. The other could now be a small dwarf star, or even a black hole and traveling along too close to see maybe, or it just got blown away, and then Zeta Oph would just have "continued on its way". But I don't see an S.R. anywhere nearby, and I suppose it could be obscured by denser dust in another part of the nebulosity...

I was thinking along the same lines as Boomer12k - follow Zeta Oph's track backward and see if it passes near a supernova remnant. When I followed the links in the story, this seems to have been done for some runaway stars. But links to supernova info say that the supernova explosion can be assymetrical, so the SNR could recoil from the blast. I suppose it could gain a new velocity of unknown speed and direction. Still, it might be possible to find an SNR that's consistent with Zeta Oph's speed, distance and timing. I assume the companion SNR would have been mentioned if it were known.

Let's see, the last link in the story implies that Zeta Oph is about 4 million years old. At 24 km./sec. X 31 million sec/yr. X 4,000,000 yr. = about 3 X 10 to the 15th power kilometers moved since the explosion. So Zeta Oph has moved (3 X 10 to 15th km.) X (9.5 trillion km./light-year) = 316 light-years since the explosion. Since it's 460 l.y. away, it's moved about arctan(316/460) = 34 degrees across the sky, unless my math is wrong. Assuming the remnant's speed is the same or less, you'd have a circle of sky to search that's 68 degrees across. At least, it's within a thousand l.y. from us, which is pretty close.

Boomer12k, unless you have a very large telescope, I presume you did not "see" a consistent supernova remnant in a list of them. I'm curious to know what that list is.

CMatisse wrote:Since it is moving so fast, does this mean it is in a different position every night?

Boomer12k wrote:I don't see a supernova remnant anywhere nearby. But maybe it is too faint now. I am thinking that if a larger companion exploded, then THIS would become the more massive, and the companion would now be dragged along with Zeta Oph. It would not have been "Flung" out of the system. It would just become the dominant mass of the system. The other could now be a small dwarf star, or even a black hole and traveling along too close to see maybe, or it just got blown away, and then Zeta Oph would just have "continued on its way". But I don't see an S.R. anywhere nearby, and I suppose it could be obscured by denser dust in another part of the nebulosity...

Psnarf wrote:
You can find two of them on the full-sized image. They appear to be triangular in shape. Pretty hot to show up so bright in the infrared. Probably the same space monkeys that the ufo enthusiasts saw floating over south Phoenix/Tempe, AZ. a couple of years ago.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_triangle_%28UFO%29

• Or possibly, it's Upsilon OPH

Lordcat Darkstar wrote:

Shamanomaha wrote:
I notice a bright red dot in the star field just to the left of the shock wave. Any ideas what that could be?

If you zoom in you can see it has a halo around it. Kind of looks like planetary nebula to me.