Hubble Observes Supermassive Black Holes Ejecting Dying Stars from Host Galaxies

A new analysis of 13 supernovae — including archived data from NASA's Hubble Space Telescope — is helping astronomers explain how some young stars exploded sooner than expected, hurling them to a lonely place far from their host galaxies.

Astronomers hypothesize that a pair of supermassive black holes in the merging galaxies can provide the gravitational slingshot to rocket the binary stars into intergalactic space. Hubble observations reveal that nearly every galaxy has a massive black hole at its center.

According to astronomer Ryan Foley's scenario, after two galaxies merge, their black holes migrate to the center of the new galaxy, each with a trailing a cluster of stars.

As the black holes dance around each other, slowly getting closer, one of the binary stars in the black holes' entourage may wander too close to the other black hole. Many of these stars will be flung far away, and those ejected stars in surviving binary systems will orbit even closer after the encounter, which speeds up the merger.

Please join +Tony Darnell Dr.+Carol Christian and +Scott Lewis as they discuss these observations with lead investigator Dr. Ryan Foley of the University of Illinois.  As always, we welcome your questions and comments.

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#Space   #astronomy   #blackholes   #hubble   #galaxies   #cosmology

[Belialith]

You know what? That's just freaky. I just started studying those deep space photos Hubble took, and then looking at other photos, and I noticed in some places, that stars seemed to leave their shell behind like some snail leaves its shell behind. It was like, what? This is so weird. Is there like a soul in a star, and when it wants to go somewhere else, it just ex or im plodes and leaves that space to go somewhere else? I mean, I never knew there were so many, as you call them, supernovas, star explosions, until I listened to this. Then I started wondering about those stars I saw in those Hubble pictures, and things are starting to make a picture story, hahaha, that this universe is really strange, and a heck of a lot more alive than what I thought it was.

[aardvarkmindshank]

Brilliant as always and a very eloquent guest this week.

I kinda missed any conclusion as to why the calcium rich nature of these supernova is a factor or a result of any part of the mechanics of ejection or why they end up calcium rich.... Must listen closer next time!

[ThePaYseR]

i heard yesterday on some chanel that light actualy can escape from black am i wrong ?

[tonycrofts]

I have always been fascinated by the INFINATE univese, where did it emerge, and why are its GALAXIES all moving away from each other, at 186, 000 miles per second (Speed of light!). Will mankind ever be able to explore it, without being able to travel at Light speed, let alone AT WARP SPEED (Star Trek), on a related issue our life spans are too short, to allow any STAR TRAVEL in a single lifetime, then one wonders why are WE HERE AT ALL! Does GOD HAVE A SENSE OF HUMOUR?