(ORDO NEWS) — Astronomers have obtained an image of cold molecular gas outside of galaxies.
For many years, scientists have assumed that cold streams of gases form in space, which sometimes enter galaxies, where they fuel the formation of stars.
However, it was difficult to prove this because of the cold nature of the streams, and therefore they emit little energy and not in the range in which it is easy to observe.
Now Bjorn Emonts and his colleagues have been able to detect such a stream feeding the galaxy 4C 41.17.
The observations were made with the ALMA millimeter telescope located in Chile. The discovered stream consists mainly of carbon, and its length exceeds half a million light-years.
At the same time, the estimate of the composition may be inaccurate, and scientists do not have data on where this flow comes from.
The authors plan to continue the study using the Very Large Array radio telescope, which will be able to detect traces of carbon monoxide in the stream – which was also predicted theoretically.
In addition, scientists want to identify key features that will allow them to find similar flows in the future, as well as create a model for the accretion of this gas in galaxies.
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