There is a cloudy patch space in our galaxy that produces unexpected gamma radiation at clockwork-like intervals. Scientists have now linked these periodic pulses to a ‘microquasar’ – probably a black hole – located several hundred light-years away, in what is an extraordinary observation.
New research published today in Natuurastronomy describes an unusual long-distance relationship with a radioactive gas cloud, called Fermi J1913 + 0515, and a microquasar, named SS 433, both of which are located in the Milky Way.
Data collected over the past 10 years suggest that the objects are inextricably linked and work in synchronization, despite the enormous distance they separate. The authors of the new paper, led by Jian Li of Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron and Diego Torres of the Institute of Space Sciences, are not entirely sure what happens or how the microquasar causes the gamma-ray heartbeat of the gas cloud. once every 162 days.
Lying 15,000 light-years from Earth, microquasar SS 433 is one of the most fascinating places in the galaxy. It is a binary system consisting of a compact object, probably a black hole, but possibly a neutron star, and an overweight star. The proposed black hole weighs between 10 and 20 solar masses (of which 1 solar mass is equal to most of our Sun), while the star has a mass of 30 solar masses. Stuck together, the objects spin once every 13 days. SS 433 is a pint-sized version of a normal quasar, a kind of cosmic object that contains very heavy black holes filled with millions of solar masses.
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This celestial union generates an array of detective ephemera in the form of gamma rays, X-rays, radio waves, and hydrogen gas. The big star throws a lot of its material on the black hole, resulting in an intense accumulation of gases.
“This material collects on an accretion disk before falling into the black hole, like water in the shrinkage above the turn of a bath,” Li explained in a press release. “However, part of that case does not fall under the turn, but shoots out at high speed into two narrow jets in opposite directions above and below the rotating action disk.”
These jets generate X-rays and gamma rays due to the combined forces of high-velocity particles and ultra-strong magnetic fields that reside in the binary system. That said, the action disk around the black hole does not rest perfectly flat along the orbital plane of the two objects.
“It advances, or swings, like a spinning top set shoes on a table,” Torres said in the DESY release. “As a consequence, the two jets spiral into the surrounding space, instead of just forming a straight line.”
This presence fluctuates with a period lasting 162.25 days. And as new research shows, Fermi J1913 + 0515 emits a gamma-ray signal in perfect synchronization with the microquasar, even though it’s 100 light-years away. Except here, there is nothing particularly special about this cloudy patch of space, but the data, collected with NASA’s Fermi-gamma-ray telescope, suggest that the gamma-ray heartbeat is powered by microquasar SS 433.
To make matters even more surprising, the microquasar jets, even with the advancement, did not cross the path of Fermi J1913 + 0515, as Li explained in an email.
“This is the first time we have seen this observation result, and is unexpected from previously published theoretical models,” he said.
Li and his colleagues are not very sure how the microquasar drives the gas cloud remotely, but they think protons from the equatorial outflow of SS 433 interact with the cloud, leading to the gamma-ray emission and observed heartbeat. -like periodical.
“To maintain the coherence of the heartbeat, a magnetic tube can connect the gas cloud and SS 433,” Li said in his email.
More observations of the objects and a new theoretical explanation to explain this unexpected finding and the hypothesis “magnetic tube” would advance this work. One thing is certain, however: This space of space, located in the constellation Aquila (or Eagle), is now one of the most fascinating places in the Milky Way.
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