Astronomy Picture of the Day 7-12-02

NASA ^ | 7-12-02 | Robert Nemiroff and Jerry Bonnell

[petuniasevan]

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer.

2002 July 12

Recycling Cassiopeia A
Credit: R. Fesen (Dartmouth) and J. Morse (CASA, U. Colorado), Hubble Heritage Team, NASA

Explanation: For billions of years, massive stars in our Milky Way Galaxy have lived spectacular lives. Collapsing from vast cosmic clouds, their nuclear furnaces ignite and create heavy elements in their cores. After a few million years, the enriched material is blasted back into interstellar space where star formation begins anew. The expanding debris cloud known as Cassiopeia A is an example of this final phase of the stellar life cycle. Light from the explosion which created this supernova remnant was probably first seen in planet Earth's sky just over 300 years ago, although it took that light more than 10,000 years to reach us. In this gorgeous Hubble Space Telescope image of cooling filaments and knots in the Cas A remnant, light from specific elements has been color coded to help astronomers understand the recycling of our galaxy's star stuff. For instance, red regions are dominated by emission from sulfur atoms while blue shades correspond to oxygen. The area shown is about 10 light-years across.

[petuniasevan]

Astronomy Fun Fact:

The material from the Cassiopeia A explosion is rushing outward at supersonic speeds in excess of ten million miles per hour.
As this matter crashes into gas that surrounds the former star, shock waves analogous to awesome sonic booms heat the gas and heat the ejected matter.

Get on the APOD PING list!

[petuniasevan]

APOD PING!

[BossyRoofer]

How awsome that we exist for a moment in this great explosion & understand thats our life!

[leadpenny]

"Oh Christmas Tree, Oh Christmas Tree . . "

[MeekOneGOP]

Incredible picture. Thanks!

[2Trievers]

"Dimensions: The bright remnant shell has a diameter of about 4 parsecs (13 light-years)."

Humbling. &;-)

[aomagrat]

Wow!

[sleavelessinseattle]

Nice Wake!

[2Trievers]

TECHNICOLOR WAKES ... MY SPECIALTY! NEXT YOU'LL WANT PANAVISION AND 3-D I SUPPOSE? LOL &;-)

[sleavelessinseattle]

Smellovision, Feelorama, Gravity Simulation...HEY if I'm being taken for a ride? I want the TOTAL Package...ALL WAYS!|;-D

[headsonpikes]

'Heavy Metal Kid' bump. ;^)

[RightWhale]

Everywhere we look we see material ejected from exploded stars. Instances where such material is condensing to form new stars seem rare by comparison. They say the material that makes earth has been processed through stars several times, but if the Milky Way is 15 billion years old, has there been time for this to happen frequently? A few instances [100 or so observed within 200 or so lightyears of the sun and heavy elements such as iron still not seen in earthsized quantities] seems possible, not 30 billion solar systems as an earlier thread discussed.

[MozartLover]

WOW!

[MozartLover]

You two have to see this!

[MozartLover]

Look at this! Isn't it gorgeous???

[Utah Girl]

Thanks for the ping! That is spectacular.

[MozartLover]

Okay, I finally bumped the "Fox Fur Nebula" off my screen.........this is my new wallpaper.:)

[kayak]

These pictures really humble me.

Genesis 1

¹⁶ God made two great lights - the greater light to govern the day and the lesser light to govern the night. He also made the stars.
¹⁷ God set them in the expanse of the sky to give light on the earth,
¹⁸ to govern the day and the night, and to separate light from darkness. And God saw that it was good.

[JRandomFreeper]

It is very beautiful. Thanks for the ping.

/john