Revealed Today at NASA: Space Movie Shows Shocking Secrets of the Crab Pulsar
Crab Nebula Composite Image
A composite image of the Crab Nebula showing the X-ray (blue), and optical (red) images superimposed. The size of the X-ray image is smaller because the higher energy X-ray emitting electrons radiate away their energy more quickly than the lower energy optically emitting electrons as they move.
Photo Credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/ASU/J. Hester et al.; Optical: NASA/HST/ASU/J. Hester et al.
19 September 2002 -- Just when it seemed like the summer movie season had ended, two of NASA's Great Observatories have produced their own action movie. Multiple observations made over several months with NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory and the Hubble Space Telescope have captured the spectacle of matter and antimatter propelled to near the speed of light by the Crab pulsar, a rapidly rotating neutron star the size of Manhattan.
David N. Burrowes, professor of astronomy and astrophysics at Penn State, is among the scientists who will reveal the movie for the first time at 1:00 p.m. today during a press conference at NASA headquarters in Washington, DC.
The press conference will be carried live on NASA Television with two-way question-and-answer capability for reporters covering the briefing from NASA centers. NASA Television is broadcast on satellite GE-2, transponder 9C, at 85 degrees West longitude, vertical polarization, frequency 3880 MHz, audio of 6.8 MHz. The briefing will also be webcast live via links at http://www.nasa.gov
Images and additional information about this result will be available at: http://chandra.harvard.edu and http://chandra.nasa.gov
The Crab was first observed by Chinese astronomers in 1054 A.D. and has since become one of the most studied objects in the sky. By combining the power of both Chandra and Hubble, the movie reveals features never seen in still images. By understanding the Crab, astronomers hope to unlock the secrets of how similar objects across the universe are powered.
"Through this movie, the Crab Nebula has come to life," said Jeff Hester of Arizona State University in Tempe, lead author of a paper in the September 20th issue of the Astrophysical Journal Letters on which Burrowes and Koji Mori, a research associate at Penn State, are co-authors. "We can see how this awesome cosmic generator actually works."
Bright wisps can be seen moving outward at half the speed of light to form an expanding ring that is visible in both X-ray and optical images. These wisps appear to originate from a shock wave that shows up as an inner X-ray ring. This ring consists of about two dozen knots that form, brighten and fade, jitter around, and occasionally undergo outbursts that give rise to expanding clouds of particles, but remain in roughly the same location.
X-ray, Optical & Radio Composite
A composite image of the Crab Nebula showing X-ray in blue, optical in green, and radio in red.
Photo Credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/ASU/J. Hester et al.; Optical: NASA/HST/ASU/J. Hester et al.; Radio: VLA/NRAO
"These data leave little doubt that the inner X-ray ring is the location of the shock wave that turns the high-speed wind from the pulsar into extremely energetic particles," Mori said.
Another dramatic feature of the movie is a turbulent jet that lies perpendicular to the inner and outer rings. Violent internal motions are obvious, as is a slow motion outward into the surrounding nebula of particles and a magnetic field.
"The jet looks like steam from a high-pressure boiler," said Burrows, "except when you realize you are looking at a stream of matter and anti-matter electrons moving at half the speed of light!"
The inner region of the Crab Nebula around the pulsar was observed with Hubble on 24 occasions between August 2000 and April 2001 at 11-day intervals, and with Chandra on eight occasions between November 2000 and April 2001. The Crab was observed with Chandra's Advanced CCD Imaging Spectrometer and Hubble's Wide-Field Planetary Camera. The ACIS X-ray camera was conceived and developed for NASA by Penn State and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology under the leadership of Gordon Garmire, Evan Pugh Professor of Astronomy and Astrophysics at Penn State.
NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., manages the Chandra program, and TRW, Inc., Redondo Beach, Calif., is the prime contractor. The Smithsonian's Chandra X-ray Center controls science and flight operations from Cambridge, Massachusetts. The Space Telescope Science Institute is operated by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Inc. (AURA), for NASA, under contract with the Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. The Hubble Space Telescope is a project of international cooperation between NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA).
Time-Lapse Movie Of Crab Pulsar Wind
This movie shows dynamic rings, wisps and jets of matter and antimatter around the pulsar in the Crab Nebula as observed in X-ray light by Chandra (left, blue) and optical light by Hubble (right, red). The movie was made from 8 Chandra observations taken between November 2000 and April 2001 and 8 Hubble observations made between August 2000 and April 2001.
Movie can be viewed at http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2002/0052/movies.html
Panelists at the press conference include:
-- Paul Hertz, senior scientist and Chandra program executive, Astronomy and Physics Division, Office of Space Science, NASA Headquarters, Washington, DC
-- John Jeffrey Hester, professor, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Arizona State University, Tempe, Arizona
-- David N. Burrows, senior scientist and professor, Penn State University, University Park, Pennsylvania
-- Victoria Kaspi, physics professor, McGill University, Montreal, Canada
-- Robert P. Kirshner, Clowes Professor of Science, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts
CONTACTS:
Megan Watzke, Chandra X-ray Observatory Center, Phone: 617-496-7998
Dolores Beasley, NASA Headquarters, Phone: 202-358-1753
Steve Roy, Marshall Space Flight Center, Phone: 256-544-6535
Barbara Kennedy, Penn State, Phone: 814-863-4682
These and other IMAGES are available at: http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2002/0052/more.html