Clouds of star-forming gas are being shot 'like bullets' across the galaxy

[Judi Lynn]

By Brandon Specktor - Senior Writer 2 hours ago

Astronomers are still looking for the "smoking gun" that blasted these clouds through space.



The cold molecular cloud known as the "Finger of God" is a stellar nursery in the Milky Way, just like two clouds recently discovered near the galaxy's center.
(Image: © NASA/ Hubble)

There's a flood of scorching nuclear wind pouring out of our galaxy's center, and astronomers have discovered two tiny islands of unborn baby stars caught in the riptide.

These two hunks of cosmic driftwood are actually freezing-cold clouds of hydrogen gas, each one as frigid as Pluto (about minus 400 degrees Fahrenheit, or minus 240 degrees Celsius) and carrying the mass of more than 200 suns. In calmer waters, they could be stellar nurseries — those ultra-dense clouds of gas where molecules can bundle up into stars. However, the searing winds of the galactic center seem to have other plans for them, a new study published Aug. 19 in the journal Nature suggests.

Flying "like bullets" away from the galactic center, the two tiny clouds of gas seem to be colliding head-on with hotter, more energetic winds from the galaxy's heart, according to the study. This ongoing collision threatens to dismantle the gas clouds entirely, smothering their star-forming potential.

"Galaxies can be really good at shooting themselves in the foot," study co-author Naomi McClure-Griffiths, an astrophysicist at The Australian National University (ANU), said in a statement. "When you drive out a lot of mass, you're losing some of the material that could be used to form stars, and if you lose enough of it, the galaxy can't form stars at all anymore."

More:
https://www.livescience.com/cold-cloud-milky-way-nuclear-wind.html

[Karadeniz]

1. Amazing!

[paleotn]

2. Looks like the ...

middle finger of god to me. Even she hates Donnie.

[CatLady78]

3. Ok so it isn't just me...

Looked like the middle finger to me too...