by BDanielMayfield » Wed Sep 04, 2013 1:08 pm
That link bystander provided is fascinating too. From it I copy this:
This light-year-long knot of interstellar gas and dust resembles a caterpillar on its way to a feast. But the meat of the story is not only what this cosmic caterpillar eats for lunch, but also what's eating it. Harsh winds from extremely bright stars are blasting ultraviolet radiation at this "wanna-be" star and sculpting the gas and dust into its long shape.
The culprits are 65 of the hottest, brightest known stars, classified as O-type stars, located 15 light-years away from the knot, towards the right edge of the image. These stars, along with 500 less bright, but still highly luminous B-type stars make up what is called the Cygnus OB2 association. Collectively, the association is thought to have a mass more than 30,000 times that of our Sun.
So it’s the gang of 65 O and 500 B stars in the neighbourhood off camera to the right that are emitting the radiation that’s blowing the gas and dust away from this nebula. I found the fact that there are 65 O stars in its vicinity to be amazing, since main sequence O stars are so rare. Wikipedia says that O stars make up only 0.00003 % of all stars, which is good because
they are all destined to go supernova at some point. I’m also glad that this object and more importantly the rowdy gang of 65 are 4,500 light years away!
[quote="bystander"][b][i] http://asterisk.apod.com/viewtopic.php?t=32010 [/i][/b][/quote]
That link bystander provided is fascinating too. From it I copy this:
[quote]This light-year-long knot of interstellar gas and dust resembles a caterpillar on its way to a feast. But the meat of the story is not only what this cosmic caterpillar eats for lunch, but also what's eating it. Harsh winds from extremely bright stars are blasting ultraviolet radiation at this "wanna-be" star and sculpting the gas and dust into its long shape.
The culprits are 65 of the hottest, brightest known stars, classified as O-type stars, located 15 light-years away from the knot, towards the right edge of the image. These stars, along with 500 less bright, but still highly luminous B-type stars make up what is called the Cygnus OB2 association. Collectively, the association is thought to have a mass more than 30,000 times that of our Sun.[/quote]
So it’s the gang of 65 O and 500 B stars in the neighbourhood off camera to the right that are emitting the radiation that’s blowing the gas and dust away from this nebula. I found the fact that there are 65 O stars in its vicinity to be amazing, since main sequence O stars are so rare. Wikipedia says that O stars make up only 0.00003 % of all stars, which is good because [color=#FF0000]they are all destined to go supernova[/color] at some point. I’m also glad that this object and more importantly the rowdy gang of 65 are 4,500 light years away!