Herschel Space Telescope
Herschel finds a hole in space
by Alexandre Costa on May.11, 2010, under Herschel Space Telescope
Source: ESA News
NGC 1999: Truly a hole in space. Credit: ESA/Herschel.
ESA’s Herschel infrared space telescope has made an unexpected discovery: a hole in space. The hole has provided astronomers with a surprising glimpse into the end of the star-forming process.
Stars are born in dense clouds of dust and gas that can now be studied in unprecedented detail with Herschel. Although jets and winds of gas have been seen coming from young stars in the past, it has always been a mystery exactly how a star uses these to blow away its surroundings and emerge from its birth cloud. Now, for the first time, Herschel may be seeing an unexpected step in this process. (read more)
Herschel’s HIFI follows the trail of cosmic water
by Alexandre Costa on May.07, 2010, under Herschel Space Telescope, Nebula
Source: ESA Science and Technology
Water is an extremely important molecule in the Universe, abundant in a large variety of cosmic environments — from our own blue planet and its neighbourhood, the Solar System, through interstellar clouds where new stars and planets are formed, and even beyond the Milky Way, in star-forming galaxies. Due to the large amount of water vapour present in the Earth’s atmosphere, however, astronomical observations of water from ground-based facilities are virtually impossible, even from the driest and highest deserts; they need to be carried out with space observatories.
Herschel’s HIFI instrument was especially designed to follow the water trail in the Universe over a wide range of scales, from the Solar System out to extragalactic sources. Early results, presented this week at the Herschel First Results Symposium, demonstrate how HIFI uses water to probe the physical and chemical conditions in different regions of the cosmos.(read more)
Herschel reveals galaxies in the GOODS fields in a brand new light
by Alexandre Costa on May.06, 2010, under Galaxies, Herschel Space Telescope
Source: ESA Science and Technology
The discovery of a previously unresolved population of galaxies in the GOODS fields and the first measurements of properties of galaxies in the almost unexplored far-infrared domain are among the first exciting scientific results achieved by Herschel’s PACS and SPIRE instruments. These findings confirm the extraordinary capabilities of ESA’s new infrared space observatory to investigate the formation and evolution of galaxies. (read more)
