Search
HW News ARCHIVE

Hubble Helps Astronomers Solve Cosmic Puzzle

A new mosaic image of the Orion Nebula complex has been created with thanks to the Almighty Hubble Space Telescope. This already famous, large star formation is situated around 1,400 light-years from Earth, and with thanks to discovery, it’s about to get even more exposure.

Daniel Okafor
Daniel OkaforSenior AI Reporter
3 min read
Hubble Helps Astronomers Solve Cosmic Puzzle

A new mosaic image of the Orion Nebula complex has been created with thanks to the Almighty Hubble Space Telescope. This already famous, large star formation is situated around 1,400 light-years from Earth, and with thanks to discovery, it’s about to get even more exposure. While astronomers were busy creating the image of the Orion Nebula they may have just solved a cosmic puzzle that dates back over 500 years when a multiple-star system in the complex broke apart.

Three stars that scientists reckon were part of the same star system when it first broke up all those years ago were all ejected in different directions. Two of those stars were traced and had been previously observed, but scientist figured the third to be a runaway star – until now. “The new Hubble observations provide very strong evidence that the three stars were ejected from a multiple-star system. Astronomers had previously found a few other examples of fast-moving stars that trace back to multiple-star systems, and therefore were likely ejected. But these three stars are the youngest examples of such ejected stars. They’re probably only a few hundred thousand years old. In fact, based on infrared images, the stars are still young enough to have disks of material leftover from their formation”, stated Kevin Luhman of Penn State University and lead researcher on the project.”

This three-frame illustration shows how a grouping of stars can break apart, flinging the members into space. Panel 1: members of a multiple-star system orbiting each other. Panel 2: two of the stars move closer together in their orbits. Panel 3: the closely orbiting stars eventually either merge or form a tight binary. This event releases enough gravitational energy to propel all of the stars in the system outward, as shown in the third panel.
Credits: NASA, ESA, and Z. Levy (STScI)
The image by NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope shows a grouping of young stars, called the Trapezium Cluster (center). The box just above the Trapezium Cluster outlines the location of the three stars. A close-up of the stars is top right. The birthplace of the multi-star system is marked “initial position.” Two of the stars — labeled BN, and “I,” for the source I — was discovered decades ago. The source I is embedded in thick dust and cannot be seen. The third star, “x,” for source x, was recently discovered to have moved noticeably between 1998 and 2015, as shown in the inset image at bottom right.
Credits: NASA, ESA, K. Luhman (Penn State University), and M. Robberto (STScI)

It was Hubble’s infrared abilities that enabled the astronomers to make their observations and look behind the Orion Nebula’s gas and dust clouds. The European Space Agency (ESA) said that among the stars that were spotted, astronomers viewed one that was moving at around 200,000 kilometers an hour, which is thought to be the runaway star from the original system that broke up some 540 years ago. But, until further observations have been made, that’s still speculation for the moment.

More News to Read

Related Coverage

Google · Preferred Sources

Don't miss new tech stories on Google

Add TrendinTech once in the Google app and our stories appear in your news suggestions.

Add Now
CosmicGalaxyHubblenasasciencespaceThe European Space Agency
Daniel Okafor

Daniel Okafor

Senior AI Reporter

Daniel Okafor is the Senior AI Reporter at TrendinTech, where he covers large language models, machine learning research and the practical use of artificial intelligence across business and government. He previously reported on artificial intelligence for MIT Technology Review, covering the labs behind the current generation of frontier models and the policy debates in Washington and Brussels. Daniel holds a Master of Science in Machine Learning from Carnegie Mellon University and follows the research community closely, attending NeurIPS and ICML each year to speak with the people behind the papers. He has a particular interest in evaluation: how models are benchmarked, where those benchmarks fail and what that means for the companies betting on them.

All stories by Daniel Okafor (316)