Young Stellar Object Ve 7–27 and Neutron Star | European Southern Observatory
This object, known as Ve 7–27, was long believed to be a planetary nebula—the end phase of a sun-like star’s life. However, the European Southern Observatory's Very Large Telescope (VLT) has shown that it is a still-forming star.
For years the true nature of this nebula had been debated, but the VLT’s MUSE instrument has captured the first detailed image of this object. It shows that Ve 7-27 is shooting energetic jets with knots or ‘bullets’ along them. This is typical for newborn stars. "Instead of being the 'last breath' of a dying star, Ve 7-27 is a newborn one," says Janette Suherli, a PhD candidate at the University of Manitoba, Canada, and first author of the study that revealed this surprising finding.
Image Description: The image shows a bright star at the center of an hourglass-shaped cloud. The star is shooting a jet along the axis of the hourglass. The jet is not a continuous line but has knots or clumps along it. A yellowish-green smudge is visible right next to the bright star, the remains of a dead star that expelled a lot of material visible in this image, enshrouding the young star, too.
However, there is a dead star nearby. The compact yellowish-green smudge to the center-left of this image hosts a neutron star produced when a massive star exploded as a supernova. This nebula is part of a larger cloud ejected by the explosion, the Vela Junior supernova remnant. The MUSE observations revealed that the baby star Ve 7-27 is embedded in the material expelled by this supernova. The distance to Vela Junior had not been pinpointed before. Today, we now know this object is close to Ve 7-27. Since Ve 7-27 is known to be about 4500 light-years away, so is Vela Junior. Confirming the distance to Vela Junior means we know its size, how fast it is expanding, how energetic it is, and how long ago the supernova exploded, solving decades of inconsistencies. Vela Junior represents an “outstanding case of stellar birth and stellar death co-existing side by side in the same environment,” according to Suherli.
Release Date: Jan. 26, 2026
Read science paper "Intertwined Birth and Death: A Herbig–Haro Outflow Resolves the Distance to Vela Junior": https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/2041-8213/ae27c4
ReplyDelete