![A new view of the Milky Way from the Murchison Widefield Array, with the lowest frequencies in red, middle frequencies in green, and the highest frequencies in blue. Huge golden filaments indicate enormous magnetic fields, supernova remnants are visible as little spherical bubbles, and regions of massive star formation show up in blue. [The supermassive black hole at the centre of our galaxy is hidden in the bright white region in the centre.] Credit: Dr Natasha Hurley-Walker (ICRAR/Curtin) and](https://news7f.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/skynews-all-sky-view-milky-way_5804155.jpg)
Stars experience earthquakes similar to those on our planet, scientists have discovered.
Formally known as non-radial oscillations, earthquakes are tsunami-like movements in the crusts of stars that alter the star’s shape by their strong force.
They were discovered based on data collected on nearly two billion stars in our galaxy by the Gaia space observatory, which was not originally built to detect these motions on Earth. surface of stars.
“Gaia has previously detected radial oscillations that cause stars to periodically inflate and contract, while retaining their spherical shape,” said the European Space Agency (ESA). have also detected other large-scale tsunami-like oscillations.”
ESA’s new Gaia data can show stellar metal with color – with red stars richer in metal. Photo: ESA
Earthquakes were detected in thousands of stars, along with stellar tremors that, according to current theories, shouldn’t have caused any earthquakes.
Conny Aerts of KU Leuven in Belgium, a member of the Gaia collaboration, said: “Starquakes teaches us a lot about stars, especially their inner workings. Gaia is opening a mine. gold for the ‘biology’ of massive stars”.
Operated by the ESA, Gaia orbits Earth at a distance of about 1.5 million kilometers – carrying two telescopes designed to create an accurate three-dimensional map of the Milky Way.
This “DNA map” is a multidimensional catalog of asteroids, planets, stars and galaxies, and has unearthed many discoveries with successive data releases.
Gaia also shows interstellar dust throughout the Milky Way. Photo: ESA
The data includes a range of information “including chemical composition, stellar temperature, color, mass, age, and the rate at which stars are moving toward or away from us,” according to the ESA.
Dr Nicholas Walton, one of the scientists from the University of Cambridge’s Institute of Astronomy who worked on the project, said: “The release of this important data from Gaia not only enables astronomers maps the distances and motions of about two billion stars in our galaxy, but it also provides detailed measurements of the physics and chemistry that make up such a large number of objects for the first time. first.
“With this incredible database, we were able to build a panorama of the Milky Way and delve into its incredible history, seeing first-hand evidence of both the Milky Way’s interactions. past violence with other galaxies and violent internal star formations along its spiral arms.
Dr Walton added: “This new release of data creates a bank of insights that essentially act as a DNA map allowing us to understand our galaxy’s stellar population and track its past, present and future”.
