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A remarkable sight has been spotted in X-ray light: a human-like hand.
This 2009-era image, made with Chandra X-ray data from 2004 through 2008, showcases the structure of the pulsar wind nebula, MSH 15-52, along with the X-ray emissions of a different energy found near the top of the fingertips: the supernova remnant RCW 89. Subsequent studies, especially in other wavelengths of light, have uncovered the structural link between these two seemingly disparate components of the nebula.
Above, this nebula was first revealed by NASA’s Chandra X-ray observatory.
This artist’s concept image of the Chandra X-ray Observatory is now 30 years old. Launched in 1999, Chandra remains humanity’s most powerful, highest-resolution X-ray observatory, and one of the original four NASA great observatories along with Hubble, Spitzer, and Compton. It continues to reveal the X-ray universe to us, and is an at-risk mission for decommissioning with looming NASA science budget cuts.
It resides 17,000 light-years away, on the outskirts of an enormous star-forming region in Circinus.
Although the “Hand of God” nebula MSH 15-52, is most spectacularly imaged by Chandra (in gold), infrared data from NASA’s WISE (in all other colors) showcases the gas, dust, and star-forming nebulous material located nearby. This star-forming complex, overall, is thousands of light-years across, dwarfing the impressive pulsar wind nebula, which itself is “only” 150 light-years or so wide.
Hints to its existence arose in 1982: with pulsar PSR B1509-58‘s discovery.
This side-by-side set of images shows a series of views of the Crab Pulsar and its surrounding environment taken by NASA’s Chandra X-ray telescope (left) and NASA’s Hubble space telescope (right) over the 6-month period from November 2000 to April 2001. Formed from a star that went supernova in 1054, the Crab pulsar is one of the youngest known neutron stars, and the ringed feature around the pulsar was only discovered due to Chandra’s revolutionary X-ray capabilities. A similar pulsar, PSR B1509-58, likely displays similar phenomena, but is too far away to observe with the same resolution as the Crab Pulsar.
Credits: NASA/CXC/ASU/J.Hester et al.; NASA/HST/ASU/J.Hester et al.; stevebd1/YouTube
Regular radio pulses, emitted every 150 milliseconds, indicate a pulsar.
This four-color image, colorized by energy, gave astronomers their first view of the energetic and complex nebula surrounding the pulsar PSR B1509-58 in the year 2000. The green “dots” at the top indicate the location of the supernova remnant that spawned the pulsar, but the remaining features are only apparent in X-ray and radio wavelengths.
Shortly after, an optical counterpart was found, implicating a supernova ~1700 years ago.
This multiwavelength image of the “Hand of God” nebula, MSH 15-52, highlights X-rays spanning energies as low as 500 electron-volts all the way up to 25,000 electron-volts, combining data from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and its Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array (NuSTAR). Additional data, from optical, infrared, and radio observations, can further reveal the structure of the material surrounding this supernova remnant.
It’s analogous to the much closer Crab Nebula, which detonated in 1054.
This decade-long timelapse, from 2008 to 2017, shows incredibly detailed features in the gaseous and filamentary structures of the Crab Nebula expanding over time. Over the timescale of this animation, the nebula has further increased in size by about a tenth of a light-year, allowing us to visualize the passage of extremely large timescales in mere instants, and to comprehend the incredible speeds at which material is ejected from a supernova.
A dense, compact neutron star spins rapidly, generating intense magnetic fields.
This computer simulation of a neutron star shows charged particles being whipped around by a neutron star’s extraordinarily strong electric and magnetic fields. It is possible that a neutron star has formed within the remnant of SN 1987A, but the region is still too dusty and gas-rich for the “pulses” to seep out. Neutron star surfaces are at similar temperatures to white dwarf interiors: typically at several hundred thousand kelvin.
Inside, charged particles like electrons are swiftly accelerated.
As seen in its full glory, as imaged by JWST, the Crab Nebula possesses detailed features never spotted before, including doubly ionized sulfur atoms, dense dust grains located along a central belt, and wispy smoke-like signals that trace out synchrotron radiation: radiation emitted by accelerated electrons. It’s not just a visual feast, but a trove of scientific riches contained within.
NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, T. Temim (Princeton University)
Surrounding the central source, emission features change rapidly.
The supernova remnant MSH 15-52, estimated at 1700 years old, is one of the youngest such remnants in the Milky Way. The remnant and its X-ray emissions have changed dramatically just in the time they’ve been observed, with 2004, 2008, and 2018-era emissions all shown here for comparison.
But MSH 15-52’s pulsar also impacts the surrounding environment, not merely supernova ejecta.
This animated look at the pulsar wind nebula MSH 15-52 switches between infrared views, revealing background stars only, X-ray views with Chandra, which give the highest-resolution views of the nebula, and X-ray views with IXPE, which are blurrier than Chandra’s view but include polarization. The polarization data enables a map of the underlying magnetic field, which point back towards the central pulsar as the culprit.
Polarization studies allow us to trace the surrounding magnetic field.
It all points back to the central pulsar: carving and shaping this windy nebula.
This image shows a composite of radio, optical, and X-ray light of the “Hand of God” nebula MSH 15-52, where the polarization data is shown with lines, indicating the orientation of the nebula’s magnetic field. There are complex filaments inside the nebula that align with this field, revealing the far-reaching influence of the magnetized pulsar at the nebula’s core.
New observations highlight radio waves,
This new view, in radio light with the Australian Telescope Compact Array, has revealed new structures in the nebula MSH 15-52 in radio light. When combined with X-ray and optical data, it paints a more comprehensive picture of what’s going on inside this astronomical marvel.
neutral hydrogen atoms,
This optical view of the nebula MSH 15-52, also known as the Hand of God nebula, highlights light emitted at 656.3 nanometers: light from electrons in hydrogen atoms cascading from the (n=3) state down to the (n=2) state. This light, known as Balmer alpha, is the brightest optical line emitted by energetic regions of space rich in hydrogen.
and X-ray emissions,
This most up-to-date view of the nebula MSH 15-52 in X-ray light comes courtesy of NASA’s Chandra X-ray observatory. Note that the pulsar, at the center of the “base” of the hand, is offset from the supernova remnant itself, near the top-right of the image, indicating that the neutron star has been blow aside with an incredibly rapid kick at about 5% of the speed of light.
which, when all combined together, reveal emissions even beyond the supernova blast wave’s edge.
The complex and intricate shape revealed by multiwavelength views of MSH 15-52 show that many of the X-ray and radio features located far from the supernova remnant but close to the pulsar itself arise not from the supernova ejecta or blast wave, but rather from the pulsar and its winds and magnetic field interacting with the dense surrounding interstellar medium in this location.
Spanning 150 light-years across, it’s one of the largest pulsar wind nebulae ever found.
This annotated, labeled version of the nebula MSH 15-52 also shows the nearby supernova remnant, RCW 89, and the location of the pulsar, PSR B1509-58. Note how offset the pulsar is from the supernova remnant, indicating that the pulsar has been ejected away from the nebula’s original location very rapidly. Since the supernova only dates to ~1700 years ago and the image is ~150 light-years wide at this scale, a rapid “kick” is the only reasonable explanation.
Why the radio emissions extend beyond the X-ray’s boundaries remains mysterious.
Mostly Mute Monday tells an astronomical story in images, visuals, and no more than 200 words.
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