European Space Agency’s (ESA) X-ray space observatory XMM-Newton has X-rayed a beautiful cosmic creature known as the Manatee Nebula, and has found the location of unusual particle acceleration in its ‘head’. XMM-Newton is the biggest scientific satellite ever built in Europe and has telescope mirrors which are amongst the most powerful ever developed in the world.
What Is The Manatee Nebula?
The Manatee Nebula, of W50, was formed when a giant star, 18,000 light-years away from Earth in the constellation Aquila, exploded around thirty thousand years ago. W50 is a supernova remnant and flings its shells of gases out across the sky.
The Manatee Nebula is one of the largest such features known, and spans the equivalent size of four full Moons. A black hole remains at the core of the Manatee Nebula, which is unusual for a supernova remnant. The black hole feeds on gas it collects from a very close companion star. The nebula’s gas disc and powerful magnetic field lines act like an enormous railroad system.
The Manatee Nebula catches charged particles and channels them outward as powerful jets travelling at nearly the speed of light, according to the National Radio Astronomy Observatory. This system shines brightly in both radio waves and X-rays and is collectively known as the SS 433 microquasar, which emits powerful jets of particles. These particles travel at speeds close to a quarter the speed of light that punch through the gassy shells, creating the double-lobed shape.
What Do The Colours In The Manatee Nebula Image Captured By ESA Represent?
According to the ESA, SS 433 is identified by the red dot in the middle of the image. The colours yellow, magenta and cyan represent the X-ray data acquired by XMM-Newton. Yellow represents soft X-rays, magenta represents medium energy X-rays, and cyan rep represents hard X-ray emission.
The red colour denotes radio and green optical wavelengths imaged by the Very Large Array and the Skinakas Observatory in Greece, respectively.
In 2018, the High-Altitude Water Cherenkov Observatory, which is sensitive to very high energy gamma-ray photons, revealed the presence of highly energetic particles. These have hundreds of tera electron volts of energy. However, the High-Altitude Water Cherenkov Observatory could not pinpoint the location the Manatee particles were originating from.
ESA’s XMM Newton Pinpointed Region Of Particle Acceleration In The Nebula
This is where XMM-Newton came into the picture. The X-ray space observatory pinpointed the region of particle acceleration in the X-ray jet blasting from the Manatee’s head, which begins about 100 light years away from the microquasar. The microquasar is represented by the magenta and cyan colours toward the left side.
The Manatee’s head extends to approximately 300 light years, and coincides with the radio ‘ear’ where the shock terminates.
The study describing the findings has been accepted for publication in the Astrophysical Journal. The paper titled “Hard X-ray emission from the eastern jet of SS 433 powering the W50 ‘Manatee’ nebula: Evidence for particle re-acceleration” is available on arXiv, an open-access repository of electronic preprints.
According to an ESA statement, Samar Safi-Harb, who led the study, said that thanks to the new XMM-Newton data, supplemented with NASA NuSTAR (Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array) and Chandra data, the researchers believe the particles are getting accelerated to very high energies in the head of the Manatee through an unusually energetic particle acceleration process.
Safi-Harb explained that the black hole outflow likely made its way to the head of the Manatee and has been re-energised to high-energy radiation at that location. This could be due to shock waves in the expanding gas clouds and enhanced magnetic fields.
What Is Next?
According to the ESA, the Manatee Nebula acts as a nearby laboratory for exploring several astrophysical phenomena associated with the outflows of many galactic and extragalactic sources. ESA’s future Athena (Advanced Telescope for High ENergy Astrophysics) X-ray observatory is expected to provide even more sensitive details about the inner workings of the Manatee Nebula.