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August 16, 2021
from University of California – Santa Cruz
A region of active star formation in the constellation Ophiuchus gives astronomers new insights into the formation conditions of our own solar system. In particular, a new study of the star formation complex Ophiuchus shows how our solar system could have been enriched with short-lived radioactive elements.
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Evidence for this enrichment process has been around since the 1970s, when scientists studying certain mineral inclusions in meteorites concluded that they were pristine remnants of the young solar system and contained the decay products of short-lived radionuclides. These radioactive elements could have been blown onto the nascent solar system by a nearby exploding star (a supernova) or by the strong stellar winds of a massive star known as the Wolf-Rayet star.
The authors of the new study, published Aug. 16 in Nature Astronomy, used multi-wavelength observations of the Ophiuchus star-forming region, including spectacular new infrared data, to reveal interactions between the clouds of star-forming gas and radionuclides found in a nearby cluster of young stars. Their results suggest that supernovae in the star cluster are the most likely source of short-lived radionuclides in the star formation clouds.
« Our solar system was most likely formed in a huge molecular cloud along with a young star cluster, and one or more supernova events of some massive ones Stars in this cluster contaminated the gas that turned into the sun and its planetary system, « said co-author Douglas NC Lin, professor emeritus of astronomy and astrophysics at UC Santa Cruz. « Although this scenario has been suggested in the past, the strength of this paper is that it uses multiple wavelength observations and sophisticated statistical analysis to derive a quantitative measure of the likelihood of the model. » for Computational Astrophysics at the Flatiron Institute said data from space-based gamma-ray telescopes enables the detection of gamma rays emitted by the short-lived radionuclide aluminum-26. « These are challenging observations. We can only convincingly demonstrate it in two star-forming regions, and the best data come from the Ophiuchus complex, » he said.
The Ophiuchus cloud complex contains many dense protostellar nuclei in various stages of star formation and protoplanetary disk evolution, which represent the earliest stages in the formation of a planetary system. By combining image data in the wavelength range from millimeters to gamma rays, the researchers were able to visualize an aluminum-26 flow from the nearby star cluster towards the Ophiuchus star-forming region.
« The enrichment process we see in Ophiuchus agrees with that what happened during the formation of the solar system 5 billion years ago, « Forbes said. « When we saw this beautiful example of how the process could go, we tried to model the nearby star cluster that produced the radionuclides we see in gamma rays today. »
Forbes developed a model that would represent any massive star that may have existed in this region, including its mass, age, and probability of exploding as a supernova, and the potential yields of aluminum-26 from stellar winds and supernovae. The model enabled him to determine the probabilities of various scenarios observed today for the production of aluminum-26.
« We now have enough information to say that there is a 59 percent probability of supernovae and a 68 – Percent probability it came from multiple sources and not just one supernova, « Forbes said.
This type of statistical analysis maps probabilities to scenarios that astronomers have debated over the past 50 years, Lin noted. « This is the new direction for astronomy to quantify probability, » he said.
The new findings also show that the amount of short-lived radionuclides incorporated into emerging star systems can vary widely. « Many new star systems are born with aluminum-26 abundances in line with our solar system, but the variation is huge – several orders of magnitude, » Forbes said. « This is important for early planetary system development, as aluminum-26 is the primary early heat source. More aluminum-26 likely means drier planets. »
The infrared data that allowed the team to travel through dusty clouds into the The heart of the star formation complex was created by co-author João Alves from the University of Vienna as part of the VISION study of nearby star kindergartens of the European Southern Observatory with the VISTA. won telescope in Chile.
« Ophiuchus as a star-forming region is nothing special, » said Alves. « It’s just a typical configuration of gas and young massive stars, so our results should be representative of the accumulation of short-lived radioactive elements in star and planet formation in the Milky Way. »
The team also used data from the Herschel Space Observatory the European Space Agency (ESA), ESA’s Planck satellite and NASA’s Compton Gamma-Ray Observatory.
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