Using a powerful telescope, scientists view spiral pattern of gaseous emissions around LL Pegasi and its companion star.
Using a powerful telescope, scientists view spiral pattern of gaseous emissions around LL Pegasi and its companion star.
An international team of astronomers has observed a striking spiral pattern in the gas surrounding a red giant star named LL Pegasi and its companion star 3,400 light-years from Earth, using a powerful telescope in northern Chile called Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array, or ALMA.
“What we are seeing in splendid detail with these observations is the final act of a dying red giant star, as it sheds most of its gaseous bulk in a strong, outflowing wind,” said study co-author Mark Morris, UCLA professor of physics and astronomy.
After comparing their telescopic observations with computer simulations, the astronomers concluded that a highly elliptical orbit is responsible for the shape of the gaseous emissions surrounding this system.
Read more at University of California - Los Angeles
Image: This is a molecular gas around star LL Pegasi. (Credit: ALMA, Hyosun Kim)
