A speeding star is caught on Hubble's camera

Esahubble_opo1019b_1024

esahubble_opo1019b July 22nd, 2010

Credit: NASA, ESA, O. Gnedin (University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, USA), and W. Brown (Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, Cambridge, Mass., USA)

This NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image shows the hypervelocity star that was kicked out of the centre of our Milky Way galaxy with enough energy to escape the galaxy's gravitational grip. Dubbed HE 0437-5439, the stellar speedster may have been a member of a triple-star system and was jettisoned from the galaxy by the monster central black hole. Galaxies in this image provide a grid of landmarks, which astronomers used to measure the full speed of this stellar outcast over 3 1/2 years. The stellar outcast is rocketing through the Milky Way's distant outskirts at 2.6 million kilometres per hour, high above the galaxy's disk, about 200,000 light-years from the centre. The star is destined to roam the empty depths of intergalactic space. Based on the speed and position of HE 0437-5439, the star would need 100 million years to have journeyed from the Milky Way's core. Yet its mass nine times that of our Sun and blue colour mean that it should have burned out after only 20 million years far shorter than the transit time it took to get to its current location. The most likely explanation for this paradox is that the star is a blue straggler, a pair of smaller and longer-lived stars that merged during flight. Hubble's Advanced Camera for Surveys made this observation on 8 July 2006, in near-infrared light.

Provider: Hubble Space Telescope | ESA

Image Source: https://www.spacetelescope.org/images/opo1019b/

Curator: ESA/Hubble, Garching bei München, Germany

Image Use Policy: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License

Image Details

Image Type
Observation
Object Name
HE 0437-5439
Subject - Milky Way
Star > Type > Blue Straggler
Esahubble_opo1019b_128
 

Position Details

Position (ICRS)
RA = 4h 38m 12.7s
DEC = -54° 33’ 10.3”
Orientation
North is 145.2° CCW
Field of View
1.6 x 1.6 arcminutes
Constellation
Dorado

Color Mapping

  Telescope Spectral Band Wavelength
Blue Hubble (ACS) Infrared (Z) 850.0 nm
Spectrum_base
Blue
Esahubble_opo1019b_1280
×
ID
opo1019b
Subject Category
B.3.2.5  
Subject Name
HE 0437-5439
Credits
NASA, ESA, O. Gnedin (University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, USA), and W. Brown (Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, Cambridge, Mass., USA)
Release Date
2010-07-22T15:00:00
Lightyears
Redshift
Reference Url
https://www.spacetelescope.org/images/opo1019b/
Type
Observation
Image Quality
Distance Notes
Facility
Hubble Space Telescope
Instrument
ACS
Color Assignment
Blue
Band
Infrared
Bandpass
Z
Central Wavelength
850
Start Time
Integration Time
Dataset ID
Notes
Coordinate Frame
ICRS
Equinox
J2000
Reference Value
69.552729359, -54.5528479714
Reference Dimension
1932.0, 1932.0
Reference Pixel
966.0, 966.0
Scale
-1.36755599832e-05, 1.36755599832e-05
Rotation
145.17999999999984
Coordinate System Projection:
TAN
Quality
Full
FITS Header
Notes
Creator (Curator)
ESA/Hubble
URL
http://www.spacetelescope.org/
Name
Email
Telephone
Address
Karl-Schwarzschild-Strasse 2
City
Garching bei München
State/Province
Postal Code
D-85748
Country
Germany
Rights
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
Publisher
ESA/Hubble
Publisher ID
esahubble
Resource ID
opo1019b
Metadata Date
2019-10-07T11:41:42.695075
Metadata Version
1.1
×

 

Detailed color mapping information coming soon...

×

There is no distance meta data in this image.

 

Providers | Sign In