{"id":10197,"date":"2015-03-23T12:00:13","date_gmt":"2015-03-23T16:00:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/?p=10197"},"modified":"2015-03-20T22:41:28","modified_gmt":"2015-03-21T02:41:28","slug":"odd-nova-of-1670-now-explained-as-collision-of-two-stars","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/?p=10197","title":{"rendered":"Odd nova of 1670 now explained as collision of two stars"},"content":{"rendered":"

A new report from the European Southern Observatory<\/a>\u00a0(ESO):<\/p>\n

Colliding Stars Explain Enigmatic Seventeenth Century Explosion<\/a>
\n<\/strong>APEX observations help unravel mystery of Nova Vulpeculae 1670<\/em><\/p>\n

New observations made with APEX and other telescopes reveal that the star that European astronomers saw appear in the sky in 1670 was not a nova, but a much rarer, violent breed of stellar collision. It was spectacular enough to be easily seen with the naked eye during its first outburst, but the traces it left were so faint that very careful analysis using submillimetre telescopes was needed before the mystery could finally be unravelled more than 340 years later. The results appear online in the journal Nature on 23 March 2015.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a>The nova of 1670 recorded by Hevelius<\/p>\n

Some of seventeenth century\u2019s greatest astronomers, including Hevelius<\/a> \u2014 the father of lunar cartography \u2014 and Cassini<\/a>, carefully documented the appearance of a new star in the skies in 1670. Hevelius described it as nova sub capite Cygni \u2014 a new star below the head of the Swan \u2014 but astronomers now know it by the name Nova Vulpeculae 1670 [1]<\/a>. Historical accounts of novae are rare and of great interest to modern astronomers. Nova Vul 1670 is claimed to be both the oldest recorded nova and the faintest nova when later recovered.<\/p>\n

The lead author of the new study, Tomasz Kami\u0144ski (ESO and the Max Planck Institute for Radio Astronomy, Bonn, Germany) explains: \u201cFor many years this object was thought to be a nova, but the more it was studied the less it looked like an ordinary nova \u2014 or indeed any other kind of exploding star<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n

When it first appeared, Nova Vul 1670 was easily visible with the naked eye and varied in brightness over the course of two years. It then disappeared and reappeared twice before vanishing for good. Although well documented for its time, the intrepid astronomers of the day lacked the equipment needed to solve the riddle of the apparent nova\u2019s peculiar performance.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a>The remnant of the nova of 1670<\/a> seen with modern instruments<\/p>\n

During the twentieth century, astronomers came to understand that most novae<\/a> could be explained by the runaway explosive behaviour of close binary stars. But Nova Vul 1670 did not fit this model well at all and remained a mystery.<\/p>\n

Even with ever-increasing telescopic power, the event was believed for a long time to have left no trace, and it was not until the 1980s that a team of astronomers detected a faint nebula surrounding the suspected location of what was left of the star. While these observations offered a tantalising link to the sighting of 1670, they failed to shed any new light on the true nature of the event witnessed over the skies of Europe over three hundred years ago.<\/p>\n

Tomasz Kami\u0144ski continues the story: \u201cWe have now probed the area with submillimetre and radio wavelengths. We have found that the surroundings of the remnant are bathed in a cool gas rich in molecules, with a very unusual chemical composition.<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n

As well as APEX<\/a>, the team also used the Submillimeter Array<\/a> (SMA) and the Effelsberg radio telescope<\/a> to discover the chemical composition and measure the ratios of different isotopes<\/a> in the gas. Together, this created an extremely detailed account of the makeup of the area, which allowed an evaluation of where this material might have come from.<\/p>\n

\"Wide-field<\/a>This wide-field view<\/a> shows the sky around the location of the historical<\/em>
\nexploding\u00a0star Nova Vul 1670. The remains of the nova are only very<\/em>
\n faintly\u00a0visible at the centre of this picture.<\/em><\/p>\n

What the team discovered was that the mass of the cool material was too great to be the product of a nova explosion, and in addition the isotope ratios the team measured around Nova Vul 1670 were different to those expected from a nova. But if it wasn\u2019t a nova, then what was it?<\/span><\/p>\n

The answer is a spectacular collision between two stars, more brilliant than a nova, but less so than a supernova, which produces something called a red transient<\/a>. These are a very rare events in which stars explode due to a merger with another star, spewing material from the stellar interiors into space, eventually leaving behind only a faint remnant embedded in a cool environment, rich in molecules and dust. This newly recognised class of eruptive stars fits the profile of Nova Vul 1670 almost exactly.<\/p>\n

Co-author Karl Menten (Max Planck Institute for Radio Astronomy, Bonn, Germany) concludes: \u201cThis kind of discovery is the most fun: something that is completely unexpected!<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n

http:\/\/cdn.eso.org\/videos\/medium_podcast\/eso1511a.m4v<\/a><\/video><\/div>\n

Zooming in<\/a> on the location of Nova Vul 1670 in the constellation of Vulpecula<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A new report from the European Southern Observatory\u00a0(ESO): Colliding Stars Explain Enigmatic Seventeenth Century Explosion APEX observations help unravel mystery of Nova Vulpeculae 1670 New observations made with APEX and other telescopes reveal that the star that European astronomers saw appear in the sky in 1670 was not a nova, but a much rarer, violent … Continue reading Odd nova of 1670 now explained as collision of two stars<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10197","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-astronomy"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p34aWK-2Et","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":15903,"url":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/?p=15903","url_meta":{"origin":10197,"position":0},"title":"ESO: Ancient galactic megamergers observed","author":"TopSpacer","date":"April 25, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"The latest report from ESO (European Southern Observatory); Ancient Galaxy Megamergers\u00a0 The ALMA and APEX telescopes have peered deep into space \u2014 back to the time when the Universe was one tenth of its current age \u2014 and witnessed the beginnings of gargantuan cosmic pileups: the impending collisions of young,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Astronomy"","block_context":{"text":"Astronomy","link":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/?cat=12"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/eso1812a1.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":9032,"url":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/?p=9032","url_meta":{"origin":10197,"position":1},"title":"ESO: Construction secrents of a galactic metropolis","author":"TopSpacer","date":"October 15, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"The latest news from the European Southern Observatory (ESO) Construction Secrets of a Galactic Metropolis Astronomers have used the APEX telescope to probe a huge galaxy cluster that is forming in the early Universe and revealed that much of the star formation taking place is not only hidden by dust,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Astronomy"","block_context":{"text":"Astronomy","link":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/?cat=12"},"img":{"alt_text":"eso1431c_600x353","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/10\/eso1431c_600x353.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":11879,"url":"https:\/\/hobbyspace.com\/Blog\/?p=11879","url_meta":{"origin":10197,"position":2},"title":"ESO: A young dwarf galaxy emerges from the debris of a cosmic collision","author":"TopSpacer","date":"December 9, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"The latest report from the\u00a0ESO\u00a0(European Southern Observatory): VLT Revisits a Curious Cosmic Collision The spectacular aftermath of a 360 million year old cosmic collision is revealed in great detail in new images from ESO\u2019s Very Large Telescope at the Paranal Observatory. 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