4
Jan 15

Herschel discovers galaxy cluster core ablaze with star formation.

Source: ESA/Herschel

Herschel_Chandra_Subaru_xdcpj004_295Galaxy Cluster Fireworks.
Credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/INAF/P.Tozzi, et al; Optical: NAOJ/Subaru and ESO/VLT; Infrared: ESA/Herschel/J. Santos, et al.

In the present universe galaxy clusters cores are typically populated by massive "red and dead" galaxies. At some point in cosmic history, however, these galaxies must have formed the bulk of their stars. Now Herschel has observed a massive cluster labelled XDCP0044 at redshift z=1.58 (lookback time ~9.5 Gyr) where galaxies in the cluster core exhibit strikingly high amounts of star formation, the first time this has been seen in a massive cluster (Santos et al. 2015).

For more information on this discovery and figure captions see the ESA Herschel SciTech web release.

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24
May 13

Rare merger reveals secrets of galaxy evolution

Source: ESA/Herschel

Massive_galaxy_merger_caught_in_the_act_large
Massive galaxy merger caught in the act.
Image credits:ESA/NASA/JPL-Caltech/UC Irvine/STScI/Keck/NRAO/SAO.

A rare encounter between two gas-rich galaxies spotted by ESA’s Herschel space observatory indicates a solution to an outstanding problem: how did massive, passive galaxies form in the early Universe? (read more)

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7
May 13

Herschel finds hot gas on the menu for Milky Way’s black hole

Credit: ESA/Herschel

Galactic_centre_large

ESA’s Herschel space observatory has made detailed observations of surprisingly hot molecular gas that may be orbiting or falling towards the supermassive black hole lurking at the centre of our Milky Way galaxy.(read more)

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30
Apr 13

Herschel closes its eyes on the Universe

Source: ESA Press Release 11-2013

Herschel_and_Vela_C_large
Herschel and Vela C.
Image copyright: ESA/PACS & SPIRE Consortia, T. Hill, F. Motte,
Laboratoire AIM Paris-Saclay, CEA/IRFU – CNRS/INSU
Uni. Paris Diderot, HOBYS Key Programme Consortium.

ESA's Herschel space observatory has exhausted, as planned, its supply of liquid helium coolant, concluding over three years of pioneering observations of the cool Universe.

The mission began with over 2300 litres of liquid helium, which has been slowly evaporating since the final top-up the day before Herschel's launch on 14 May 2009.

The evaporation of the liquid helium was essential to cool the observatory's instruments to close to absolute zero, allowing Herschel to make highly sensitive scientific observations of the cold Universe until today.

The confirmation that the helium is finally exhausted came this afternoon at the beginning of the spacecraft's daily communication session with its ground station in Western Australia, with a clear rise in temperatures measured in all of Herschel's instruments.

"Herschel has exceeded all expectations, providing us with an incredible treasure trove of data that will keep astronomers busy for many years to come," says Prof. Alvaro Giménez, ESA's Director of Science and Robotic Exploration.

Herschel has made over 35 000 scientific observations, amassing more than 25 000 hours of science data from about 600 observing programmes. A further 2000 hours of calibration observations also contribute to the rich dataset, which is based at ESA's European Space Astronomy Centre, near Madrid in Spain.

The archive will become the legacy of the mission. It is expected to provide even more discoveries than have been made during the lifetime of the Herschel mission.

"Herschel's ground-breaking scientific haul is in no little part down to the excellent work done by European industry, institutions and academia in developing, building and operating the observatory and its instruments," adds Thomas Passvogel, ESA's Herschel and Planck Project Manager.

The mission resulted in a number of technological advancements applicable to future space missions and potential spin-off technologies. The mission saw the development of advanced cryogenic systems, the construction of the largest telescope mirror ever flown in space, and the utilisation of the most sensitive direct detectors for light in the far-infrared to millimetre range. Manufacturing techniques enabling the Herschel mission have already been applied to the next generation of ESA's space missions, including Gaia.

"Herschel has offered us a new view of the hitherto hidden Universe, pointing us to previously unseen processes of star birth and galaxy formation, and allowing us to trace water through the Universe from molecular clouds to newborn stars and their planet-forming discs and belts of comets," says Göran Pilbratt, ESA's Herschel Project Scientist.

Star birth

Herschel's stunning images of intricate networks of dust and gas filaments within our Milky Way Galaxy provide an illustrated history of star formation. These unique far-infrared observations have given astronomers a new insight into how turbulence stirs up gas in the interstellar medium, giving rise to a filamentary, web-like structure within cold molecular clouds.

If conditions are right, gravity then takes over and fragments the filaments into compact cores. Deeply embedded inside these cores are protostars, the seeds of new stars that have gently heated their surrounding dust to just a few degrees above absolute zero, revealing their locations to Herschel's heat-sensitive eyes.

Following the water trail

Over the first few million years in the life of newborn stars, the formation of planets can be followed in the dense discs of gas and dust swirling around them. In particular, Herschel has been following the trail of water, a molecule crucial to life as we know it, from star-formation clouds to stars to planet-forming discs.

Herschel has detected thousands of Earth ocean's worth of water vapour in these discs, with even greater quantities of ice locked up on the surface of dust grains and in comets.

Closer to home, Herschel has also studied the composition of the water-ice in Comet Hartley-2, finding it to have almost exactly the same isotopic ratios as the water in our oceans.

These findings fuel the debate about how much of Earth's water was delivered via impacting comets. Combined with the observations of massive comet belts around other stars, astronomers hope to understand whether a similar mechanism could be at play in other planetary systems, too.

Galaxies across the Universe

Herschel has also contributed to our knowledge of star formation on the grandest scales, spanning much of cosmic space and time. By studying star formation in distant galaxies, it has identified many that are forming stars at prodigious rates, even in the early years of the Universe's 13.8 billion-year life.

These intense star-forming galaxies produce hundreds to thousands of solar masses' worth of stars each year. By comparison, our own Milky Way galaxy produces the equivalent of only one Sun-like star per year on average.

How galaxies can support star formation on such massive scales during the first few billions of years of the Universe's existence is an unsolved mystery for scientists studying galaxy formation and evolution. Herschel observations are hinting that when the Universe was young, galaxies had much more gas to feed from, enabling high rates of star formation even in the absence of the collisions between galaxies normally needed to spark these spectacular bouts of star birth.

"Although this is the end of Herschel observing, it is certainly not the end of the mission - there are plenty more discoveries to come," says Dr Pilbratt.

"We will now concentrate on making our data accessible in the form of the best possible maps, spectra and various catalogues to support the work of present and future astronomers. Nevertheless we're sad to see the end of this phase: thank you, Herschel!"

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10
Jul 12

Flying along the Vela ridge

Source: ESA


The Vela C region, part of the Vela complex, by ESA’s Herschel space observatory.
Image credits: ESA/PACS & SPIRE Consortia, T. Hill, F. Motte, Laboratoire AIM
Paris-Saclay, CEA/IRFU – CNRS/INSU – Uni. Paris Diderot, HOBYS Key Programme Consortium

A beautiful blue butterfly flutters towards a nest of warm dust and gas, above an intricate network of cool filaments in this image of the Vela C region by ESA’s Herschel space observatory.(read more)

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10
Jun 12

Blowing bubbles in the Carina Nebula

Source: ESA Space Science


Blowing bubbles in the Carina Nebula.
Image credits: ESA/PACS/SPIRE/Thomas Preibisch,
Universitäts-Sternwarte München and the
Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München.

Giant bubbles, towering pillars and cascading clouds of dust and gas fill the star-forming nursery of the Carina Nebula seen here in a stunning new view from Herschel Spacee Telescope (read more).

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13
Apr 12

Herschel spots comet massacre around nearby star

Source: ESA


Herschel’s image of Fomalhaut.
Image credits: ESA/Herschel/PACS/Bram Acke, KU Leuven, Belgium.

ESA’s Herschel Space Observatory has studied the dusty belt around the nearby star Fomalhaut. The dust appears to be coming from collisions that destroy up to thousands of icy comets every day. (read more)

 

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1
Mar 12

Fledgling stars flicker in the heart of Orion

Source: ESA News


Baby stars in Orion Nebula.
Credits: ESA/PACS/NASA/JPL-Caltech/IRAM

Astronomers using ESA’s Herschel and NASA’s Spitzer space telescopes have detected surprisingly rapid changes in the brightness of embryonic stars within the well-known Orion Nebula.(read more)

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18
Jan 12

A new view of the Eagle Nebula

Source: ESA


Stunning new Herschel and XMM-Newton image.
Image credits: X-ray: ESA/XMM-Newton/EPIC/XMM-Newton-SOC/Boulanger
Far-infrared: ESA/Herschel/PACS/SPIRE/Hill, Motte, HOBYS Key Programme Consortium;

The Eagle Nebula as never seen before. In 1995, the Hubble Space Telescope's 'Pillars of Creation' image of the Eagle Nebula became one of the most iconic images of the 20th century. Now, two of ESA's orbiting observatories have shed new light on this enigmatic star-forming region. (read more)

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6
Oct 11

Did Earth's oceans come from comets?

Source: ESA Press Release


Herschel observed comet Hartley 2  represented in its orbit on the left side and
the inset on the right side shows the image obtained with Herschel’s PACS instrument.
The two lines are the water data from HIFI instrument.
Image Credits: ESA/AOES Medialab; Herschel/HssO Consortium.

ESA's Herschel infrared space observatory has found water in a comet with almost exactly the same composition as Earth's oceans. The discovery revives the idea that our planet's seas could once have been giant icebergs floating through space.(read more)

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14
Sep 11

Herschel paints new story of galaxy evolution

Source: ESA


A galaxy accretes mass from rapid, narrow streams of cold gas.
Image credits: ESA–AOES Medialab

ESA's Herschel infrared space observatory has discovered that galaxies do not need to collide with each other to drive vigorous star birth. The finding overturns this long-held assumption and paints a more stately picture of how galaxies evolve.(read more)

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2
Aug 11

Herschel Telescope detects oxygen molecules in Space

Source: ESA/Herschel and NASA/Herschel


Herschel found oxygen molecules in the Orion nebula.
Image credit: ESA/NASA/JPL-Caltech.

ESA’s Herschel space observatory has found molecules of oxygen in a nearby star-forming cloud. This is the first undisputed detection of oxygen molecules in space. It concludes a long search but also leaves questions unanswered.

The oxygen molecules have been found in the nearby Orion star-forming complex. While atomic oxygen has been long known in warm regions of space, previous missions looking for the molecular variety – two atoms of oxygen bonded together – came up largely empty-handed.(read more)

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26
Jul 11

Enceladus rains water onto Saturn

Source: ESA


Water plumes shoot from Enceladus.
Image credits: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute.

ESA’s Herschel space observatory has shown that water expelled from the moon Enceladus forms a giant torus of water vapour around Saturn. The discovery solves a 14-year mystery by identifying the source of the water in Saturn’s upper atmosphere.

Herschel’s latest results mean that Enceladus is the only moon in the Solar System known to influence the chemical composition of its parent planet.

Enceladus expels around 250 kg of water vapour every second, through a collection of jets from the south polar region known as the Tiger Stripes because of their distinctive surface markings.

These crucial observations reveal that the water creates a doughnut-shaped torus of vapour surrounding the ringed planet.

The total width of the torus is more than 10 times the radius of Saturn, yet it is only about one Saturn radius thick. Enceladus orbits the planet at a distance of about four Saturn radii, replenishing the torus with its jets of water.  (read more)

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18
Jun 11

Herschel Space Telescope: hot from cold

Source: ESA Online Videos

 

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Over 1.5 million kilometres from Earth, ESA's Herschel space telescope has been observing the Universe for the last two years, studying the infrared radiation emitted by the coldest bodies in the cosmos. See the invisible in this edition of Space.

 

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9
May 11

Raging storms sweep away galactic gas

Source: ESA News


An artist’s impression showing a galaxy with a molecular outflow.
Credits: ESA/AOES Medialab

ESA’s Herschel infrared space observatory has detected raging winds of molecular gas streaming away from galaxies. Suspected for years, these outflows may have the power to strip galaxies of gas and halt star formation in its tracks.

The winds that Herschel has detected are extraordinary. The fastest is blowing at a speed of more than 1000 km/s, or about 10 000 times faster than the wind in a terrestrial hurricane.

This is the first time that such molecular gas outflows have been unequivocally observed in a sample of galaxies. This is an important discovery because stars form from molecular gas, and these outflows are robbing the galaxy of the raw material it needs to make new stars. If the outflows are powerful enough, they could even halt star formation altogether. (read more)

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14
Apr 11

Herschel links star formation to sonic booms

Source: ESA


Dense filaments of gas in the IC5146 interstellar cloud.
Image credits: ESA/Herschel/SPIRE/PACS/D. Arzoumanian (CEA Saclay).

ESAs Herschel space observatory has revealed that nearby interstellar clouds contain networks of tangled gaseous filaments. Intriguingly, each filament is approximately the same width, hinting that they may result from interstellar sonic booms throughout our Galaxy. (read more)

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17
Feb 11

Herschel finds less dark matter but more stars

Source: ESA


This animation shows the distribution of the dark matter, obtained
from a numerical simulation, at a redshift z~2, or when the Universe
was about 3 billion years old.
Credits: The Virgo Consortium/Alexandre Amblard/ESA

ESA’s Herschel space observatory has discovered a population of dust-enshrouded galaxies that do not need as much dark matter as previously thought to collect gas and burst into star formation.(read more)

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11
May 10

Herschel finds a hole in space

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)

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7
May 10

Herschel's HIFI follows the trail of cosmic water

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)

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6
May 10

Herschel reveals galaxies in the GOODS fields in a brand new light

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)

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