中文翻譯:
在一個神秘的宇宙中，有一顆名叫RXJ0528+2838的白矮星，距離地球730光年遠。當大多數星星結束在核心進行能量融合的過程後，它們會變成紅巨星，然後這些星星的核心會變成微弱而密集的白矮星，慢慢冷卻下去，持續整個時間。白矮星非常密集，只有量子力學才能阻止它們進一步塌縮。大約五十億年後，我們的太陽也會變成白矮星。天文學家最近使用歐洲南方天文台的超大型望遠鏡拍到了一幅精彩的圖片，顯示了RXJ0528+2838周圍出現了神秘的弓形衝擊波，這些衝擊波就像快船推開的水波一樣。這些衝擊波至少存在了一千年，天文學家目前尚未了解是什麼在驅動這些衝擊波。圖片中的紅色、綠色和藍色代表微量的發光氫、氮和氧氣體。
原文:
How is RXJ0528+2838 creating such shock waves? A recently discovered white dwarf star, the farther left of the two largest white spots, RXJ0528+2838, was found 730 light-years away from Earth. Most stars, when done fusing nuclei in their cores for energy, become red giant stars, the cores of which live on as faint dense white dwarfs that slowly cool down for the rest of time. White dwarfs are so dense that the only thing that stops them from collapsing further is quantum mechanics. In about 5 billion years, our Sun will become a white dwarf, too. The featured image, obtained with the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope, shows unexplained bow shocks around RXJ0528+2838, similar to the bow wave of water around a fast-moving ship. Astronomers don’t yet know what is powering these shocks, which have existed for at least 1,000 years. The red, green and blue colors represent trace amounts of glowing hydrogen, nitrogen and oxygen gas. Open Science: Browse 3,900+ codes in the Astrophysics Source Code Library
來源:NASA每日圖片
