NASA, Colliding Neutron Stars Create Black Hole and Gamma ray Burst
Armed with stateoftheart supercomputer models, scientists have shown that colliding neutron stars can produce the energetic jet required for a gammaray burst. Earlier simulations demonstrated that mergers could make black holes. Others had shown that the highspeed particle jets needed to make a gammaray burst would continue if placed in the swirling wreckage of a recent merger. Now, the simulations reveal the middle step of the processhow the merging stars magnetic field organizes itself into outwardly directed components capable of forming a jet. The Damiana supercomputer at Germany s Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics needed six weeks to reveal the details of a process that unfolds in just 35 thousandths of a secondless than the blink of an eye. This video is public domain and can be downloaded at: Like our videos Subscribe to NASA s Goddard Shorts HD podcast:
|
|