鹰状星云与X射线热星

2023年7月25日

The Eagle Nebula with X-ray Hot Stars
Image Credit: X-ray: Chandra: NASA/CXC/SAO, XMM: ESA/XMM-Newton; IR: JWST: NASA/ESA/CSA/STScI, Spitzer: NASA/JPL/CalTech; Visible: Hubble: NASA/ESA/STScI, ESO; Image Processing: L. Frattare, J. Major, N. Wolk, and K. Arcand

Explanation: What do the famous Eagle Nebula star pillars look like in X-ray light? To find out, NASA’s orbiting Chandra X-ray Observatory peered in and through these interstellar mountains of star formation. It was found that in M16 the dust pillars themselves do not emit many X-rays, but a lot of small-but-bright X-ray sources became evident. These sources are shown as bright dots on the featured image which is a composite of exposures from Chandra (X-rays), XMM (X-rays), JWST (infrared), Spitzer (infrared), Hubble (visible), and the VLT (visible). What stars produce these X-rays remains a topic of research, but some are hypothesized to be hot, recently-formed, low-mass stars, while others are thought to be hot, older, high-mass stars. These X-ray hot stars are scattered around the frame — the previously identified Evaporating Gaseous Globules (EGGS) seen in visible light are not currently hot enough to emit X-rays.

Tomorrow’s picture: undersea overhead

鹰状星云与X射线热星
影像提供: X-ray: Chandra: NASA/CXC/SAO, XMM: ESA/XMM-Newton; IR: JWST: NASA/ESA/CSA/STScI, Spitzer: NASA/JPL/CalTech; Visible: Hubble: NASA/ESA/STScI, ESO; 影像处理: L. Frattare, J. Major, N. Wolk, and K. Arcand

说明: 著名鹰状星云的星柱，在X射线波段是何模样？为了找出答案，NASA的钱德拉X射线天文台，望穿了这些在诞生恒星的星际山脉。从而发现在M16中尘埃柱本身并不会发出太多的X射线辐射，但倒是找到许多小而明亮的X射线源。在这幅整合了钱德拉（X射线）、XMM（X射线）、韦伯（红外光），斯皮策（红外光），哈勃（可见光）和甚大望远镜（可见光）数据的组合主题影像里，这些X射线源是其内的明亮光点。到底是那种恒星产生了X射线，目前仍然是一个研究的题材，但有假说认为是最近刚形成的炽热小质量恒星，而其他假说则认为应是炽热较高龄的大质量恒星。这些X射线热星散布在视野各处，而先前在可见光波段辨认出的蒸发中气态云球（EGGS），目前还没热到能发出X射线。