Phil Plait of Bad Astronomy has a post today about a fascinating find regarding two gihugic , “nearly touching” stars throwing out Gamma rays like from a supernova. What boggles my mind is the fact these two stars, each over 80 times larger than our own sun, circle each other in nearly self-destructive velocities, in 1/20th the time it takes Mercury to orbit our sun.
Two massive stars speeding through space 20 times faster than our closest planet circles our sun.
Wow!
Gamma rays from monster stars.
Something about systems like this really gets me going. Two monster stars, totaling 160+ solar masses, tossing each other around their orbits twice a week (twice a week! Holy Haleakale!), blasting out thousands of times the Sun’s energy, and essentially bellowing their stellar winds with such vicious strength that they are reshaping the space around them for thousands of cubic light years.
It boggles me that such a thing can even exist, let alone be observed, understood, and even have its behavior predicted.
Man, humans are smart. I’m so proud to be one of ‘em.
Hear hear!!
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