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Scientists have discovered a massive new star system in the Milky Way galaxy that challenges existing theories about the eventual death of large stars.
"This system is probably the first of its kind to be discovered in our own galaxy," said Benjamin Pope, NASA Sagan member at New York University in the United States.
Scientists have detected a gamma-ray progenitor system – a type of supernova that sends an extremely powerful and narrow plasma jet and is thought to only occur in distant galaxies.
"We did not expect that such a system would end up in our galaxy, but only in younger, more distant galaxies," said Pope.
"Given its brightness, it's surprising that it has not been discovered much earlier," said Pope.
The system, described in the journal Nature Astronomy, has been nicknamed "Apep".
At about 8000 light-years from Earth, the system is adorned with a "spinning reel" – whose strangely slow motion suggests that current theories of star death may be incomplete.
When the most massive stars in our universe are approaching the end of their life, they produce fast winds – generally moving at more than 1,000 kilometers per second – that take away much of the mass of a star.
These fast winds should carry the star's spinning energy and slow it down well before it dies.
"These massive stars are often found with a partner, in which the fast winds of the dying star can collide with his companion to produce a shock that radiates X-rays and radio frequencies and produces exotic dust patterns. "said Joseph Callingham, postdoctoral fellow at the Netherlands Institute of Radioastronomy.
"The Apep dust wheel is moving much slower than the wind in the system," he said.
"This can happen if one of the massive stars rotates so fast that it almost tears.
"Such a rotation means that when it runs out of fuel and starts to explode as a supernova, it will collapse to the poles before the equator, producing a burst of gamma rays," Callingham said. (PTI)
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