Shooting Star, 31 Jan. '11

[GaryN]

Runaway Star Plows Through Space

A massive star flung away from its former companion is plowing through space dust. The result is a brilliant bow shock, seen here as a yellow arc in a new image from NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, or WISE.
http://wise.ssl.berkeley.edu/gallery_zeta_ophiuchi.html
Alternative descriptions, anyone?

[mharratsc]

From the article:

Astronomers theorize that this stellar juggernaut was likely once part of a binary star system with an even more massive partner. It’s believed that when the partner exploded as a supernova, blasting away most of its mass, Zeta Ophiuchi was suddenly freed from its partner’s pull and shot away like a bullet moving 24 kilometers per second (54,000 miles per hour).

Ahhh... the magic of 'wind'! Gentle winds in space do so much- blowing out bubbles of gas, creating cosmic draperies with which stars beautify their environments...

But when a star blows the heck up, what happens? Then the magic 'star-wind' becomes even more magical!

When a star went supernova it 'blew' it's binary companion away. The gravitationally-held mystical ball of pure gas that is 20 times more massive than our own Sun was able to withstand the detonation of its dance partner at point-blank range and went from 0 to 54,000 miles-per-hour *instantly*, without being extinguished or blowing up itself!

What a magical Universe we live in!!

I'm going outside to pet a unicorn because I'm so happy!

[Sparky]

http://www.thunderbolts.info/tpod/2011/ ... 31star.htm

My old eyes really hurt today...trying to focus on details in image...

what do you see, besides glow mode plasma in infrared spectrum....
how does it appear the currents are moving to generate this luminous shape?

xray and other detection would be helpful.

thanks

[mharratsc]

I dunno about you, Sparky, but I'm still waiting to see if that "bowshock" even moves with the star in question.

I for one think that the "bowshock" they're referring to is just a bent field-aligned current that the star just happens to be in proximity to.

If you look at the left side of the image, it appears to me to denser, with apparent helices. the other end seems more tenuous, maybe lower density of current?

Essentially, I'm wondering if a traveling star isn't simply behind an interstellar FEC, and is somehow illuminating the dusty plasma from behind it?

I dunno, but regardless that glowing arc sure looks to me like two twisted pairs of dusty filaments twisting together themselves, and the star in the picture seems rather superfluous to the whole deal... :\

[GaryN]

I'm not convinced that the star is anywhere near the 'bow shock', and that this is just a good photo-op to show us something that conforms to their ideas of how things work.

[mharratsc]

I agree with you Gary,and I think this thread needs to be merged in over in the TPOD section under that thread over there regarding this object.

[Sparky]

mharratsc,"I for one think that the "bowshock" they're referring to is just a bent field-aligned current that the star just happens to be in proximity to.

thank you, i agree...

If you look at the left side of the image, it appears to me to denser, with apparent helices. the other end seems more tenuous, maybe lower density of current?

yes....the helices on top of the yellow arch seem to be denser ..would current be coming into this area or out of it?

Essentially, I'm wondering if a traveling star isn't simply behind an interstellar FEC, and is somehow illuminating the dusty plasma from behind it?

would that produce infrared radiation, apparently from the plasma field?

I dunno, but regardless that glowing arc sure looks to me like two twisted pairs of dusty filaments twisting together themselves, and the star in the picture seems rather superfluous to the whole deal... :\

yes, agreed....is there a way to determine direction of current flow?...would diffuse glow indicate current flowing into, and more concentrated, twisted filaments indicate current flowing out of, or other way around? Or, Would the more "active" arch of this structure be drawing current in from all sides?

thanks for help

[GaryN]

Excellent description, IMO, Mike, and I had a feeling you would be the
one to see what I think is happening here. The 'bent' flux tube(s)
will accumulate surface charge through the same mechanisms as in a
torus, and the same 'flames' observed.
@sparky

xray and other detection would be helpful.

Yes,we would need to see a lot more of this structure, at different wavelengths
and probably much longer exposures to really see what is going on. If this is
what they say it is, I would have expected strong xrays from a 'shock' much closer
to the star.

[Sparky]

GaryN, "The 'bent' flux tube(s)
will accumulate surface charge through the same mechanisms as in a torus, and the same 'flames' observed"

These "flames"? Currents moving in or out of flux tubes?

thanks

[Nereid]

When a star went supernova it 'blew' it's binary companion away. The gravitationally-held mystical ball of pure gas that is 20 times more massive than our own Sun was able to withstand the detonation of its dance partner at point-blank range and went from 0 to 54,000 miles-per-hour *instantly*, without being extinguished or blowing up itself!

Why not?

I mean, is there anything more to this than the well-known logical fallacy of 'argument from incredulity'?

I for one think that the "bowshock" they're referring to is just a bent field-aligned current that the star just happens to be in proximity to.

(highlight added)

How would you go about testing a hypothesis based on this word description, quantitatively, using astronomical observations? What telescopes (etc) would you use (in principle)?

what do you see, besides glow mode plasma in infrared spectrum....

How did you come to conclude that it's a "glow mode plasma in infrared spectrum" Sparky?

If it's such, what do you expect the emission lines in the spectrum of it to be, if any (and why)?

[davesmith_au]

Why would you even consider the description offered with this image, Nereid. I see no source, no relevant, peer-reviewed paper, just a "word description". One good word description deserves another, don't you think?

Cheers, Dave.

[mharratsc]

Ms. Nereid asked:

How would you go about testing a hypothesis based on this word description, quantitatively, using astronomical observations? What telescopes (etc) would you use (in principle)?

I dunno... I'm not an astronomer! o.O

However, if I was to take a shot at it anyway, I think I'd check it out in RF and see if we could detect the magnetic field from the FEC, maybe check it out in X-Ray for good measure to boot and see if we weren't able to get a bigger picture of what is going on there.

My thinking is- if this were a 'bowshock', there wouldn't be a magnetic field involved with the 'shockwaves', would there?

[GaryN]

@sparky

These "flames"? Currents moving in or out of flux tubes?

There is no current flow from the inside to the outside of a torus,
or the curving flux tube(s). It's rather complicated, but with a time
varying current flowing along the axis, you end up with self-interaction
of fields, leading to a magnetic field cancellation on the outside, and
surface charge accumulation. I expect to be corrected, as I don't pretend to
understand in any detail. We need a scientist or an Electrical engineer
around here!

[Sparky]

@sparky

These "flames"? Currents moving in or out of flux tubes?

There is no current flow from the inside to the outside of a torus,
or the curving flux tube(s). It's rather complicated, but with a time
varying current flowing along the axis, you end up with self-interaction
of fields, leading to a magnetic field cancellation on the outside, and
surface charge accumulation. I expect to be corrected, as I don't pretend to
understand in any detail. We need a scientist or an Electrical engineer
around here!

Thanks, i haven't looked into torus formation and characteristics.
Tried to find that yesterday, but was unsuccessful. Guess i don't know what to search for...tried several terms.

Nereid .. "How did you come to conclude that it's a "glow mode plasma in infrared spectrum" Sparky?"

For me it is not really important that plasma is in glow mode or not. From what little i know, if it shows up in infrared, it may very well be in glow mode or above.

Whatever it is, it is glowing in infrared, and i should have caught that error in order to keep nit pickers from focusing on that inconsequential error, instead of offering an answer to the point of the question.

The point of my questioning was current flow and plasma instabilities by interpretation of image, which i have some difficulty seeing.

[mharratsc]

I'm going to be keeping my eyes open and seeing if this phenomenon gets some VLA attention in the near future. If this thing shows up with filamentary fields in the RF spectrum (and that 'shooting star' kind of fades into the distance) then I will be back here crowing like a rooster just to be annoying!