press release
June 15, 2022
Astronomers have used new observations with the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) to reveal intricate details of the star-forming region 30 Doradus, also known as the Tarantula Nebula. In a high-resolution image released today by the European Southern Observatory (ESO), containing ALMA data, we see the nebula in a new light: very thin gas clouds provide insight into how massive stars influence this region.
“These fragments could be the remains of once-larger clouds that were shredded by the enormous energy released by young, massive stars – a process called feedback.” said Tony Wong, who led the study of 30 Doradus, presented today at the American Astronomical Society (AAS) meeting and published in the Astrophysical Journal. Originally, astronomers thought the gas in these areas was too thin and too affected by this turbulent feedback for gravity to pull them together to form new stars. However, the new data also show much denser filaments in which gravity still plays a significant role.Our results suggest that even with very strong feedback, gravity can exert a strong influence and drive continued star formation.” adds Wong, a professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in the United States.
Located in the Large Magellanic Cloud, a companion galaxy to our own Milky Way, the Tarantula Nebula is one of the brightest and most active star-forming regions in our galactic neighborhood, about 170,000 light-years from Earth. At its center are some of the most massive stars in the world. Some have masses more than 150 times that of our Sun, making the region an ideal place to study how gas clouds collapse under gravity and form new stars.
“What makes 30 Doradus so unique is that the region is close enough to study star formation in detail, and its properties are similar to those found in very distant galaxies when the universe was young.” explains Guido De Marchi, a scientist at the European Space Agency (ESA) and co-author of the study presenting the new research results. “With 30 Doradus, we can study how stars formed 10 billion years ago, when most stars were born.“
While most previous studies of the Tarantula Nebula have focused on its center, astronomers have long known that intense star formation occurs elsewhere as well. To better understand this process, the team conducted high-resolution observations covering a large region of the nebula. With the help of ALMA They measured the light emission of carbon monoxide. This allowed them to map the large clouds of cold gas in the nebula that are collapsing to form new stars – and how they change as these young stars release huge amounts of energy.
“We expected that the parts of the cloud closest to the young, massive stars would show the clearest signs of gravity and would be overwhelmed by the feedback.” adds Wong. “Instead, we found that gravity was still important in these feedback-exposed regions – at least for parts of the cloud that were dense enough.“
In the image released today by ESO, the new ALMA data are superimposed on an earlier infrared image of the same region, showing bright stars and slightly pink clouds of hot gas, taken with the Very Large Telescope (ALV) and the visible and infrared survey telescope for astronomy (VIEW) were included by ESO. The composite image shows the distinctive web-like shape of the Tarantula Nebula’s gas clouds, which gave it its spider name. The new ALMA data show the bright red-yellow bands in the image: very cold, dense gas that could one day collapse and form stars.
The new research provides detailed clues about how gravity behaves in the star-forming regions of the Tarantula Nebula, but the work is far from done.There is much more to do with this fantastic dataset, and we are publishing it to encourage other researchers to conduct further research.” Wong said in conclusion.
More information
The research results presented here will be presented at the 240th meeting of the American Astronomical Society (AAS) as part of the press conference “Stars, Their Environments & Their Planets” (Wednesday, June 15, 19:15 CEST / 22:15 (Pacific Time)) Media representatives *Insiders are cordially invited to follow the live broadcast of the press conference, which is publicly accessible via the AAS Press Office YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/AASPressOffice.
The scientists involved are T. Wong (Department of Astronomy, University of Illinois, USA), L. Oudshoorn (Sterrewacht Leiden, Universiteit Leiden, The Netherlands), E. Sofovich (Illinois), A. Green (Illinois), C. Shah (Illinois), R. Indebetouw (Department of Astronomy, University of Virginia, USA and National Radio Astronomy Observatory, USA), M. Meixner (SOFIA-USRA, NASA Ames Research Center, USA), A. Hacar (Department of Astrophysics, University of Vienna, Austria), O. Nayak (Space Telescope Science Institute, USA), K. Tokuda (Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, Faculty of Science, Kyushu University, Japan and National Astronomical Observatory of Japan, National Institutes of Natural Sciences, Japan and Department of Physics, Graduate School of Science, Osaka Metropolitan University, Japan), A. D. Bolatto (Department of of Astronomy and Joint Space Science Institute, University of Maryland, USA and NRAO Visiting Astronomer), M. Chevance (Astronomical Computing Institute, Center for Astronomy at Heidelberg University), G. De Marchi (European Space Research and Technology Center, Netherlands), Y. Fukui (Department of Physics, Nagoya University, Japan), AS Hirschauer (STSci), KE Jameson (CSIRO, Space and Astronomy, Australia), V. Kalari (International Gemini Observatory, NSF NOIRLab, Chile), V. Lebouteiller (AIM, CEA, CNRS, Université Paris-Saclay, Université Paris Diderot, France), LW Looney (Illinois), SC Madden (Astrophysics Department AIM/CEA Saclay, France), Toshikazu Onishi (Osaka), J. Roman-Duval (STSci), M. Rubio (Departamento de Astronomía, University of Chile) and AGGM Tielens (Department of Astronomy, University of Maryland, USA and Leiden).
The European Southern Observatory (ESO) enables scientists from around the world to unlock the secrets of the universe for the benefit of all. We design, build and operate world-class observatories that astronomers use to answer exciting questions and spread the fascination of astronomy. We also promote international cooperation in astronomy. Founded in 1962 as an intergovernmental organisation, ESO is led by 16 Member Countries (Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, Germany, France, Finland, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Austria, Poland, Portugal, Sweden, Switzerland, Spain and the United Kingdom) and the Host Country Chile and Australia as strategic partners. ESO Headquarters and its Visitor Centre and Planetarium, ESO Supernova, are located near Munich in Germany, while the Atacama Desert in Chile, a wonderland offering unique conditions for observing the skies, is home to our telescopes. ESO operates three observing sites: La Silla, Paranal and Chajnantor. At Paranal, ESO operates the Very Large Telescope and its associated Very Large Telescope Interferometer, as well as two survey telescopes, the infrared VISTA and the visible-light VLT Survey Telescope. Also at Paranal, ESO will operate the Cherenkov Telescope Array South, the world’s largest and most sensitive gamma-ray observatory. In collaboration with international partners, ESO operates APEX and ALMA, two millimetre and submillimetre observing facilities on Chajnantor. On Cerro Armazones, near Paranal, we are building “the world’s largest eye in the sky”: ESO’s Extremely Large Telescope. From our offices in Santiago, Chile, we support our activities in the country and collaborate with Chilean partners and society.
The Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) is an international astronomical facility jointly managed by ESO, the National Science Foundation (NSF) of the United States and the National Institutes of Natural Sciences of Japan (NINS), in cooperation with the Republic of Chile. ALMA is supported by ESO on behalf of its Member Countries, by NSF in cooperation with the National Research Council of Canada (NRC), the Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST) and NINS in cooperation with the Academia Sinica (AS) in Taiwan and the Korea Institute of Astronomy and Space Science (KASI). In terms of development, construction and operation, ESO leads the European contribution, the National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO), which is in turn operated by Associated Universities, Inc. (AUI), the North American contribution, and the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan (NAOJ) for the East Asian contribution. The Joint ALMA Observatory (JAO) is responsible for the overall project management for ALMA construction, commissioning and observation operations.
The translations of ESO press releases into English are a service of the ESO Science Outreach Network (ESON), an international astronomy outreach network in which scientists and science communicators from all ESO Member Countries (and some other countries) are represented. It is the German node of the network. House of Astronomy in Heidelberg.
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Contact details
Tony Wong
Department of Astronomy, University of Illinois
Urbana-Champaign, Illinois, United States
Tel: +1 217 244 4207
E-mail: wongt@illinois.edu
Guido De Marchi
European Space Research and Technology Centre, European Space Agency
Noordwijk, Netherlands
Tel: +31 71 565 8332
Mobile: +31 6 5081 6906
E-mail: gdemarchi@esa.int
Barbara Ferreira
ESO Media Manager
Garching near Munich, Germany
Tel: +49 89 3200 6670
Mobile: +49 151 241 664 00
E-mail: press@eso.org
Markus Nielbock (press contact Germany)
ESO Science Outreach Network and House of Astronomy
Heidelberg, Germany
Tel: +49 6221 528-134
E-mail: eson-germany@eso.org
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This is a translation of ESO press release eso2209.