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| a little surprise from God. | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: May 27 2009, 09:31 PM (370 Views) | |
| the breeze | May 27 2009, 09:31 PM Post #1 |
the breeze
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Parts of Nearby Galaxy Mysteriously Missing Tuesday , May 26, 2009 ADVERTISEMENTThe giant galaxy Messier 87 has finally been sized up, but outer parts that should have been there are missing, scientists now find. The galaxy is smaller than expected. Messier 87 belongs to the Virgo Cluster of galaxies, the nearest galaxy cluster to our own Milky Way. The relatively young cluster is located about 50 million light-years away in the constellation Virgo and contains many hundreds of galaxies. A team of astronomers used the super-efficient FLAMES spectrograph at the European Southern Observatory's (ESO) Very Large Telescope in Chile to make ultra-precise measurements of a host of planetary nebulae in the outskirts of Messier 87. (Planetary nebulae are the final phase in the life of sun-like stars, when stars eject their outer layers into space.) Observing the light of the planetary nebulae in the Virgo Cluster from Earth is akin to looking at a 30-Watt light bulb from a distance of about 3.7 million miles (6 million kilometers), or about 15 times the distance between the Earth and the moon. "It is a little bit like looking for a needle in a haystack, but in the dark," said team member Magda Arnaboldi of the ESO. • Click here to visit FOXNews.com's Space Center. The new observations, detailed in an upcoming issue of the journal Astronomy and Astrophysics, show that Messier 87's halo of stars is missing some members. The team estimates that it has a diameter of about a million light-years, which is significantly smaller than expected (though still three times the extent of the Milky Way's halo). "This is an unexpected result," said team member Ortwin Gerhard of the Max-Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics in Germany. "Numerical models predict that the halo around Messier 87 should be several times larger than our observations have revealed. Clearly, something must have cut the halo off early on." Just what that something is, scientists aren't yet sure, though they have a few ideas. The collapse of dark matter nearby in the galaxy cluster could account for the "cut-off." Another possibility is that another galaxy in the cluster, Messier 84, came much closer to Messier 87 in the past (about a billion years ago) and dramatically perturbed it. "At this stage, we can't confirm any of these scenarios," Arnaboldi said. "We will need observations of many more planetary nebulae around Messier 87." One thing the observations showed for sure though is that Messier 87 is on a collision course with another nearby neighbor, Messier 86. "We may be observing them in the phase just before the first close pass," Gerhard said. "The Virgo Cluster is still a very dynamic place and many things will continue to shape its galaxies over the next billion years." Copyright © 2009 Imaginova Corp. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. |
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| ngc1514 | May 27 2009, 10:22 PM Post #2 |
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And this has what to do with "A little surprise from god?" Other than the report that the Virgo cluster is about 50 million light years away and the length of time the light has been traveling must preclude a recent creation of the universe. Or god again plays the deceiver by making the universe look older than it might be according to the Young Earth Creationists. For the rest of us.... M87 is a giant galaxy with a huge swarm of globular clusters around it. It is also noted for the plasma jet being shot out from the massive black hole at the galaxy's center. Here's a photo of the galaxy. The jet is clearly seen and the slightly fuzzy "stars" in the galaxy's halo are some of the hundreds of globular clusters. A little background info. The galaxy is known as M87 or 87th object in Charles Messier's (1730-1817) list of fuzzy objects. Messier's interest was comets and while searching for comets he kept running into comet-like objects. His catalog of these objects - the Messier Catalog - is the list most amateur astronomers start from since they represent most of the brightest non-stellar objects in the sky. Well known Messiers would include the Andromeda Galaxy (M31), the Orion nebula (M42) and the Pleiades (M45). M87 is one of the brighter galaxies on the list and is easily visible in almost any telescope. Some visual observers have reported seeing the jet with large instruments... something I've not been able to accomplish with my 16 incher.
Edited by ngc1514, May 27 2009, 10:23 PM.
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| Deleted User | May 28 2009, 12:47 AM Post #3 |
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Had to ask same question, how's this a surprise. The fact science is not precise and constantly learning new things. Well, of course, but that's not suprising. |
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| ngc1514 | May 28 2009, 01:51 AM Post #4 |
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And sometimes the numerical models are just incorrect. Sometimes a model that does not represent what is actually seen needs a bit of tweaking. But there are other times when the model is correct and we're gonna learn something new about how the universe works. One of those, "Hmmm...that's funny...." moments Asimov talked about. I expect - since breezy has us blocked - we'll never know why he considered this "a little surprise from god." And if he thinks THAT'S surprising...
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090527/ap_on_sc/us_sci_monkey_genes_2 Creationists like to tell us how mutations are never beneficial to the individual organism and can't possibly drive evolution. Most mutations are a bit of knocking around the contents of a gene and if creationists think that lethal, they must consider that adding whole new genes to an animal, especially a "higher" (for lack of a better word) animal would be deadly. And if not deadly to the individual itself, surely deadly to any offspring. Guess what? WRONG! But that's not surprising since they've yet to get anything right. |
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| Deleted User | May 28 2009, 09:12 AM Post #5 |
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"I expect - since breezy has us blocked - we'll never know why he considered this "a little surprise from god." " It wouldn't matter much if he read it. You have to engage in dialog to learn anything. |
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