Scientists have discovered where a giant gaseous state cloud that ’s on a hit course with the Milky Way comes from , and the result is closer to home than you might think .
astronomer used theHubble Space Telescopeto square up for the first time the composition of the Smith Cloud , a giant gas swarm which will merge with the Milky Way in 30 million year . And they found the swarm is full-bodied in big elements suggest that it originated in the Milky Way , not from intergalactic space .
The Smith Cloud , discovered in the 1960s , is travelling at over 310 kilometers ( 190 miles ) per second , and if it were visible in the sky it would be 30 times with child than the full Moon . It is the only high - speed swarm near our coltsfoot with a well - know orbit . stargazer believe that when the swarm deal through us , it will generate 2 million Modern star . These findings were print in theAstrophysical Journal Letters .
The cloud does n’t let loose any brightness , so its composition can not be estimated directly . The team was able-bodied to observe the composition by using background galax : as their light give through the cloud some of the Light Within gets absorbed at specific wavelengths which correspond to specific element . By looking at how pregnant the immersion is , scientists can estimate the teemingness of elements . They bet specifically at the absorption of sulphur .
“ By measuring S , you may learn how enriched in atomic number 16 speck the swarm is compared to the Sun , ” enounce team drawing card Andrew Fox of the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore in astatement .
It was long believed that the Smith Cloud originated in intergalactic space , away from champion . For this reason , scientist expected it to be only fertile in hydrogen and helium . But they discovered that the swarm has a sulfur abundance like to the Milky Way ’s outer disk , which indicate that the swarm was enrich by supernova . The squad was able to discover that the Smith Cloud had been kick out by the Milky Way about 70 million years ago , and it is now coming back .
The 100 - million - class - retentive trajectory of the Smith Cloud . Credit : NASA , ESA and A. Feild
This uncovering has a enceinte impact on understanding extragalactic nebula phylogeny , as it could help explain how galaxies go on to produce a large telephone number of new stars for a farseeing geological period of time . “ We have found several monolithic gas clouds in the Milky Way doughnut that may assist as next fuel for star formation in its disk , but , for most of them , their origins stay a mystery , ” said co - writer Nicolas Lehner , from the University of Notre Dame , in the statement .
“ The Smith Cloud is certainly one of the good examples that prove that reprocess gas is an important mechanism in the evolution of galaxies . ”
