WR 140
| Stern WR 140 | |||||||||||||
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| Die Staubschalen um WR140, aufgenommen mithilfe des James-Webb-Weltraumteleskops | |||||||||||||
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| AladinLite | |||||||||||||
| Beobachtungsdaten Äquinoktium: J2000.0, Epoche: J2000.0 | |||||||||||||
| Sternbild | Schwan | ||||||||||||
| Rektaszension | 20h 20m 27,98s [1] | ||||||||||||
| Deklination | +43° 51′ 16,3″ [1] | ||||||||||||
| Helligkeiten | |||||||||||||
| Helligkeit (V-Band) | 6,85 mag [2] | ||||||||||||
| Spektrum und Indices | |||||||||||||
| Astrometrie | |||||||||||||
| Radialgeschwindigkeit | 3,10 km/s [3] | ||||||||||||
| Physikalische Eigenschaften | |||||||||||||
| Andere Bezeichnungen und Katalogeinträge | |||||||||||||
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WR 140 ist ein Wolf-Rayet-Stern, der zusammen mit einem Stern der Spektralklasse O4-5 ein Doppelsternsystem (SBC9 1232)[4] im Sternbild Schwan bildet. Das System ein hervorragendes Beispiel für eine phasenweise Staubproduktion, bei dem aus dem silicium- und kohlenstoffhaltigen[5] Sternwind von WR 140 kondensierter kosmischen Staub verschachtelte Staubhüllen entstehen[6][7] – im Unterschied zu beispielsweise WR 104, bei dem eine spiralförmige Staubverteilung auftritt.
WR 140 ist einer der hellsten Wolf-Rayet-Sterne des Nordhimmels. Dennoch ist er masseärmer und weniger leuchtstark als der primäre Stern des Doppelsternsystems, überstrahlt aber dessen Spektrum mit seinen breiten Spektrallinien. Der primäre Stern ist ein Riesenstern oder Überriese. Spektroskopisch konnte ein stark exzentrischer Orbit mit einer Umlaufzeit von 7,9 ± 0,2 Jahren bestimmt werden: Der Abstand beider Sterne variiert von 1,3 AU im Periastron bis hin zu 23,9 AU im Apastron. Kurz nach der Periastron-Passage alle 8 Jahre steigt die Infrarotemission stark an und fällt dann über einen Zeitraum von mehreren Monaten wieder ab. In dieser Phase kollidieren Sternwind und die von dem Wolf-Rayet-Stern entstehenden Staubpartikel. Es ist allerdings noch nicht geklärt (Stand 2022), ob die besondere, konzentrische Struktur der Staubschalen durch die Interaktion der beiden Sternwinde hervorgerufen wird oder das Ergebnis von Prozessen im Kern des Wolf-Rayet-Sterns sind.[8]
Die Oberflächentemperatur des Wolf-Rayet-Sterns beträgt 70.000 Kelvin, die des Primärsterns 35.000 Kelvin.[9] Sie erzeugen eine energiereiche Ultraviolettstrahlung und erhitzen die Staubschalen auf eine Temperatur von etwa 1.000 Kelvin, so dass rund 20 Lagen im Infrarotspektrum sichtbar werden. Der Abstand der konzentrischen Schalen beträgt etwa 1,4 Billionen km (1,4·1012 km), das entspricht 3,5 % des Abstands zwischen Sonne und Alpha Centauri.[10]
Literatur
- Joshua D. Thomas et al.: The orbit and stellar masses of the archetype colliding-wind binary WR 140. In: Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. 504. Jahrgang, Nr. 4, 2021, S. 5221–5230, doi:10.1093/mnras/stab1181, arxiv:2101.10563.
- Ryan M. Lau et al.: Nested dust shells around the Wolf–Rayet binary WR 140 observed with JWST. In: Nature Astronomy. 2022, doi:10.1038/s41550-022-01812-x.
Einzelnachweise
- ↑ F. Van Leeuwen: Validation of the new Hipparcos reduction. In: Astronomy and Astrophysics. 474. Jahrgang, Nr. 2, 2007, S. 653–664, doi:10.1051/0004-6361:20078357, arxiv:0708.1752, bibcode:2007A&A...474..653V.
- ↑ J. R. Ducati: VizieR On-Line Data Catalog: Catalogue of Stellar Photometry in Johnson's 11-color system. In: CDS/ADC Collection of Electronic Catalogues. 2237. Jahrgang, 2002, bibcode:2002yCat.2237....0D.
- ↑ D. Pourbaix, A. A. Tokovinin, A. H. Batten, F. C. Fekel, W. I. Hartkopf, H. Levato, N. I. Morrell, G. Torres, S. Udry: SB9: The ninth catalogue of spectroscopic binary orbits. In: Astronomy and Astrophysics. 424. Jahrgang, Nr. 2, 2004, S. 727–732, doi:10.1051/0004-6361:20041213, arxiv:astro-ph/0406573, bibcode:2004A&A...424..727P.
- ↑ D. Pourbaix, S. Udry: VizieR Online Data Catalog: SB9: 9th Catalogue of Spectroscopic Binary Orbits (Pourbaix+ 2004-2014). In: VizieR On-Line Data Catalog: B/Sb9. Originally Published in: 2004A&A...424..727P. 1. Jahrgang, 2004, S. 727–732, doi:10.1051/0004-6361:20041213, arxiv:astro-ph/0406573, bibcode:2004A&A...424..727P.
- ↑ WR140 Introduction. In: www.roe.ac.uk. Abgerufen am 29. August 2022.
- ↑ A. F. J. Moffat, M. M. Shara: Photometric variability of a complete sample of northern Wolf-Rayet stars. In: Astronomical Journal. 92. Jahrgang, 1986, S. 952, doi:10.1086/114227, bibcode:1986AJ.....92..952M.
- ↑ J. D. Monnier, Ming Zhao, E. Pedretti, R. Millan-Gabet, J.-P. Berger, W. Traub, F. P. Schloerb, T. Ten Brummelaar, H. McAlister, S. Ridgway, L. Sturmann, J. Sturmann, N. Turner, F. Baron, S. Kraus, A. Tannirkulam, P. M. Williams: First Visual Orbit for the Prototypical Colliding-wind Binary WR 140. In: The Astrophysical Journal Letters. 742. Jahrgang, Nr. 1, 2011, S. L1, doi:10.1088/2041-8205/742/1/L1, arxiv:1111.1266, bibcode:2011ApJ...742L...1M.
- ↑ Episodic (and variable) dust-making WR stars. In: www.roe.ac.uk. Abgerufen am 2. September 2022.
- ↑ Peredur Williams: Results from the 2009 campaign on WR 140. In: Société Royale des Sciences de Liège. 80. Jahrgang, 2011, S. 595, bibcode:2011BSRSL..80..595W.
- ↑ Mark McCaughrean: Surprised no-one spotted my awful maths yet. In: Twitter. Abgerufen am 2. September 2022 (englisch).
Auf dieser Seite verwendete Medien
This image from NASA's James Webb Space Telescope reveals at least 17 concentric dust rings emanating from a pair of stars orbiting one another. Located just over 5,000 light-years from Earth, the system is known as Wolf-Rayet 140 because one of the stars is a Wolf-Rayet star. The other is an O-type star, one of the most massive star types known. Each ring was created when the two stars came close together and their stellar winds (streams of gas they blow into space) collided, compressing the gas and forming dust. A ring is produced once per orbit, every 7.93 years.
A Wolf-Rayet star is an O-type star born with at least 25 times more mass than our Sun that is nearing the end of its life, when it will likely collapse directly to black hole, or explode as a supernova. These delays between periods of dust production create the unique ring pattern. Some Wolf-Rayet binaries in which the stars are close enough together and have circular orbits produce dust continuously, often forming a pinwheel pattern. WR 140's rings are also referred to as shells because they are not perfectly circular and are thicker and wider than they appear in the image.
The rings appear brighter in some areas but are almost invisible in others, rather than forming a perfect "bullseye" pattern. That's because production of dust is variable as the stars get close to one another, and because Webb views the system at an angle and is not looking directly at the orbital plane of the stars. One of the densest regions of dust production creates the bright feature appearing at 2 o'clock.
The image was taken by the Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI), now managed by the agency's Goddard Space Flight Center. MIRI was developed through a 50-50 partnership between NASA and ESA (European Space Agency). The Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California led the effort for NASA, and a multinational consortium of European astronomical institutes contributed for ESA. Webb's science instruments detect infrared light, a range of wavelengths emitted by warm objects and invisible to the human eye. MIRI detects the longest infrared wavelengths, which means it can often see cooler objects – including these dust rings – than the other three Webb instruments can.
The filters used to take this image were the F770W (7.7 micrometers, shown as blue), F1500W (15 micrometers, shown as green), and F2100W (21 micrometers, shown as red). The observations were done under Webb's early release observation (ERO) program number 1349.
The most common element found in stars, hydrogen, can't form dust on its own. But Wolf-Rayet stars in their later stages have blown away all of their hydrogen, so they eject elements typically found deep in a star's interior, like carbon, which can form dust. Data from MIRI's Medium Resolution Spectrometer (MRS) shows that the dust made by WR 140 is likely made of a class of molecules called polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), which are a type of organic carbon-rich compounds that are thought to enrich the carbon content throughout the Universe.
Initial processing of the Webb WR 140 data included eight bright "spikes" of light emanating from the center of the image. These are not features of the system, but so-called artifacts of the telescope itself. They were removed from the image, in order to give viewers an unobscured view of the source object.Autor/Urheber: IAU and Sky & Telescope magazine (Roger Sinnott & Rick Fienberg), Lizenz: CC BY 4.0
IAU Cygnus chart
Opaque red circle