NASA launches satellite to help study the halo of the Milky Way

A tiny NASA satellite has been deployed since the International Space Station Onal (ISS) to help scientists search for the missing matter of the universe by studying the X-rays of the "halo" hot gases surrounding our Milky Way galaxy. Astronomers keep being short when they study the "normal" material, the material that makes up galaxies, stars and planets. To investigate this problem, a NASA-sponsored CubeSat mission called HaloSat was deployed from the ISS on July 13th. The cosmic microwave background (CMB) is the oldest light in the universe, dating back 400,000 years. [19659006] Calculations based on CMB observations indicate that the universe contains 5% protons of normal matter, neutrons and other subatomic particles, 25% dark matter – a substance that remains unknown – and 70% of all substances. dark energy, a negative pressure accelerating the expansion of the universe. As the universe expanded and cooled, normal matter melted into gases, dust, planets, stars, and galaxies. However, when astronomers calculate the estimated mass of these objects, they represent only about half of what cosmologists say to be present.

"We should have everything we had today when the universe was 400,000 years old," said Philip Kaaret, principal investigator at the University of Iowa (UI) in the United States, who runs the mission.

Researchers believe that the missing material may be in hot gas located in the space between galaxies or in galactic halos. surrounding individual galaxies. HaloSat will study gas in the Milky Way halo that spans about 2 million degrees Celsius. At such high temperatures, oxygen throws most of its eight electrons and produces the HaloSat X-rays will measure.

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The telescopes, like NASA's neutron star, Interior Composition Explorer and Chandra X-ray observatory, study individual sources by observing small spots of the sky. HaloSat will look at the entire sky, 100 square degrees at a time, which will help determine whether the diffused galactic halo has the shape of a fried egg or a sphere.

"If you think of the galactic halo in the model fried egg, it will have a different distribution of brightness when you look directly from the Earth than when you look at wider angles," said Keith Jahoda , astrophysicist at the Goddard Space Flight Center of NASA in the United States. "If it's in a near-spherical shape, compared to the dimensions of the galaxy, then you expect it to be more or less the same brightness in all directions," said Jahoda

] of a young star devouring planets

The shape of the halo will determine its mass, which will help scientists to understand if the missing matter of the universe is in galactic halos or elsewhere . HaloSat will collect most of its data for 45 minutes on the night half of its 90-minute orbit around the Earth. On the side of the day, the satellite will recharge with its solar panels and transmit the data to NASA's Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia, which will relay data to the Mission Operations Control Center in Blue Canyon. Colorado Technologies. HaloSat measures approximately 10x20x30 centimeters and weighs approximately 12 kilograms

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