Quantcast
Channel: Starship Asterisk*
Viewing all articles
Browse latest Browse all 811

The Bridge: Discuss an Astronomy Picture of the Day • APOD: The Eyes in Markarian's Galaxy... (2024 Mar 20)

$
0
0


I don't believe there is any known mechanism for a galaxy to "eject" or spawn another galaxy all on its own.
Correct. Not only is there no known mechanism, there's not even a remotely hypothesized one. Such a thing would violate well understood and accepted laws of nature. On the other hand, it is completely understandable how galaxies interact gravitationally, including collisions when their paths intersect.
Thanks. I had first not included the word "known" in my post, but decided to be a little less certain about it than you. However, "ejecting" a child galaxy would at least involve a prodigious amount of energy. Is a quasar even that profligate? ...Perhaps? Quasars are powered by billion solar mass black holes at the centers of galaxies, and the brightest one discovered so far has 4 trillion times the Sun's output:
Although quasars appear faint when viewed from Earth, they are visible from extreme distances, being the most luminous objects in the known universe. The brightest quasar in the sky is 3C 273 in the constellation of Virgo. It has an average apparent magnitude of 12.8 (bright enough to be seen through a medium-size amateur telescope), but it has an absolute magnitude of −26.7.[55] From a distance of about 33 light-years, this object would shine in the sky about as brightly as the Sun. This quasar's luminosity is, therefore, about 4 trillion (4×1012) times that of the Sun, or about 100 times that of the total light of giant galaxies like the Milky Way.[55] This assumes that the quasar is radiating energy in all directions, but the active galactic nucleus is believed to be radiating preferentially in the direction of its jet. In a universe containing hundreds of billions of galaxies, most of which had active nuclei billions of years ago but only seen today, it is statistically certain that thousands of energy jets should be pointed toward the Earth, some more directly than others. In many cases it is likely that the brighter the quasar, the more directly its jet is aimed at the Earth. Such quasars are called blazars.
So, maybe the energy could be available to do it, but any mechanism as you say, for ejecting several billion solar masses of stars in galaxy formation intact, would not be at all plausible. 😊
Yeah. You'd expect just a big clump or stream of stars. Not some Mini Me version of the "parent".

Statistics: Posted by Chris Peterson — Thu Mar 21, 2024 1:27 pm — Replies 7 — Views 548



Viewing all articles
Browse latest Browse all 811

Trending Articles