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SOFIA details link between supernovae and planet formation

"This discovery is a special feather in the cap for SOFIA," said project scientist Pamela Marcum.

By Brooks Hays
SOFIA data reveal warm dust (white) surviving inside a supernova remnant. The SNR Sgr A East cloud is traced in X-rays (blue). Radio emission (red) shows expanding shock waves colliding with surrounding interstellar clouds (green). Image courtesy NASA/CXO/Herschel/VLA/Lau et al
SOFIA data reveal warm dust (white) surviving inside a supernova remnant. The SNR Sgr A East cloud is traced in X-rays (blue). Radio emission (red) shows expanding shock waves colliding with surrounding interstellar clouds (green). Image courtesy NASA/CXO/Herschel/VLA/Lau et al

MOFFETT FIELD, Calif., March 20 (UPI) -- In detailing the interstellar dust cloud known as Supernova Remnant Sagittarius A East, or SNR Sgr A East, scientists on NASA's SOFIA mission were able to show how such a stellar explosion can provide the material necessary for planet formation.

Scientists have long understood that supernovas create a plethora of cosmic material -- spewed out in all directions. The questions was: could this material (gas and dust, mainly) survive the rebound shock? The rebound shock is the collapsing, inward shockwave that happens when the initial shockwave collides with resident cosmic materials and is bounced back towards the initial explosion.

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The new evidence, captured by NASA's SOFIA telescope, suggests that, indeed, it can.

"The dust survived the later onslaught of shock waves from the supernova explosion, and is now flowing into the interstellar medium where it can become part of the 'seed material' for new stars and planets," mission scientist Ryan Lau, a researcher at Cornell University, explained in a press release.

The new data suggest distant galaxies, young and dust-filled, were likely provided the material by early supernovas, explosions of massive stars.

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"This discovery is a special feather in the cap for SOFIA, demonstrating how observations made within our own Milky Way galaxy can bear directly on our understanding of the evolution of galaxies billions of light years away," said Pamela Marcum, a project scientist and researcher at the Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, California.

NASA's SOFIA telescope is not your normal observatory. It's installed in a Boeing 747SP wide-body aircraft. To utilize its infrared-observation capabilities, it must be flown in the stratosphere, at an altitude of roughly 41,000 feet, and exposed to the elements.

The new study was published this week in the journal Science.

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