HONG KONG: Scientists for the first time have got hold of an image of a glowing debris ring that is formed due to an asteroid being torn apart by a dead star.
The image was captured by scientists at the University of Warwick in the U.K. The rings consisted dust particles and debris formed due to star’s gravity ripping apart asteroids that came very close. The ultraviolet rays from the star illuminated the gas produced due to collisions within the debris ring causing it to emit a dark, red light.
Christopher Manser, of the University of Warwick’s Astrophysics Group and the lead researcher said, “We knew about these debris disks around white dwarfs for over 20 years, but have only now been able to obtain the first image of one of these disks,†in a statement.
These rings looked a lot like Saturn’s rings, but the scale of the white dwarf - SDSS1228+1040 and its dusty debris is many times greater in size.
“The diameter of the space inside the debris ring is 434,960 miles, which nearly half the size of the Sun and equal to space which could fit both Saturn and its rings, that are around 167,770 miles,” Manser said. “Astoundingly, the SDSS1228+1040 is seven times smaller than Saturn but weighs 2500 times more than it.â€
The unusual image, depicted the velocities of the gas in the disc around the white dwarf, rather than their position. The picture came out from from Very Large Telescope observations over a span of 12 years and by a method called Doppler tomography. The dashed circles represent the material in circular orbits at two different distances from the star.
