Nota de prensa
APEX REVELA BRILLANTES MATERNIDADES ESTELARES
11 de Noviembre de 2008
Ilustrando el poder de la astronomía de longitud de onda submilimétrica, una imagen de APEX muestra cómo una burbuja de gas ionizado, de unos diez años luz de extensión, se expande causando que el material circundante colapse en densas concentraciones, que son los lugares de nacimiento de nuevas estrellas. La luz submilimétrica es la clave para revelar parte del material más frío del Universo, como es el caso de estas nubes frías y densas.
La zona, llamada RCW120, está a unos 4.200 años luz de la Tierra, hacia la constelación de Escorpión. Una estrella caliente y masiva en su centro está emitiendo enormes cantidades de radiación ultravioleta, que ioniza el gas circundante, sacando los átomos de hidrógeno de los electrones y produciendo el brillo rojo característico de la llamada emisión H-alfa.
En la medida que esta zona ionizada se expande hacia el espacio, la onda expansiva asociada barre una capa del frío gas interestelar y el polvo cósmico circundantes. Esta capa se torna inestable y colapsa bajo su propia gravedad en densas concentraciones, formando frías y densas nubes de hidrógeno donde nacen nuevas estrellas. Sin embargo, cuando las nubes aún están muy frías, con temperaturas cercanas a los -250? Celsius, el débil brillo que emiten sólo puede ser visto a longitudes de onda submilimétricas. La luz submilimétrica es por tanto vital para estudiar las etapas más tempranas del nacimiento y vida de las estrellas.
Las informaciones de longitud de onda submilimétrica fueron captadas con la cámara LABOCA en el telescopio de 12 metros Atacama Pathfinder Experiment (APEX), ubicado en el llano de Chajnantor, a 5 mil metros de altura en el desierto de Atacama. Gracias a la gran sensibilidad de LABOCA, los astrónomos pudieron detectar grupos de gas frío, cuatro veces más débiles que los detectados previamente. Puesto que el brillo de los grupos es una medida de su masa, esto también significa que los astrónomos pueden estudiar ahora la formación de estrellas menos masivas de lo que antes podían.
La meseta de Chajnantor es también donde ESO, en conjunto con socios internacionales, está construyendo un telescopio submilimétrico de próxima generación, ALMA, el Atacama Large Millimeter/Submillimeter Array. ALMA usará más de sesenta antenas de 12 metros, conectadas entre si a través de distancias de más de 16 kilómetros, para formar un solo telescopio gigante.
APEX es una claboración entre el Instituto Max Planck de Radio Astronomía (MPIfR, por su sigla en inglés), el Observatorio Espacial Onsala (OSO) y ESO. El telescopio está basado en una antena prototipo construída para el proyecto ALMA. La operación de APEX en Chajnantor fue encomendada a ESO.
Contactos
Douglas Pierce-Price
ESO
Garching, Germany
Teléfono: +49 89 3200 6759
Correo electrónico: dpiercep@eso.org
Francisco Rodríguez (Contacto para medios de comunicación en Chile)
Red de Difusión Científica de ESO
y European Southern Observatory
Teléfono: +56-2-463-3151
Correo electrónico: eson-chile@eso.org
Acerca de la nota de prensa
| Nota de prensa No.: | eso0840es-cl |
| Legacy ID: | PR 40/08 |
| Nombre: | RCW120 |
| Tipo: | Milky Way : Nebula : Type : Star Formation Milky Way : Nebula : Appearance : Emission : H II Region |
| Facility: | Atacama Pathfinder Experiment |
| Instruments: | LABOCA |
Imágenes
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