Tag Archive for 'Pre-solar Nebula'

V883 Orionis is a unique protostar whose temperature is just hot enough that the water in its circumstellar disk has turned to gas, making it possible for radio astronomers to trace the water’s origins. Image credit: ESO / L. Calçada.

Deuterium-Enriched Water Ties Protoplanetary Disks to Comets and Protostars

Mar 9, 2023 by News Staff

Astronomers using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) have detected gaseous water in the planet-forming disk around V883 Orionis, a...

This is an artist impression of the protoplanetary disk around HD 107146. Image credit: A. Angelich / NRAO / AUI / NSF.

Mysterious Gap Existed within Solar System’s Protoplanetary Disk, New Research Suggests

Oct 20, 2021 by News Staff

Around 4.567 billion years ago, our Solar System harbored a gap within the protoplanetary disk, near the location where the main asteroid belt resides...

Palmerini et al. analyzed the isotopic composition of heavy neutron capture elements measured in SiC stardust grains extracted from pristine meteorites, interpreting them as the outcome of s-process nucleosynthesis occurring in the AGB stages of stars with masses between two and three solar masses and solar metallicities. Image credit: Nan Liu / Andrew Davis / NASA.

Researchers Measure Isotopic Ratios in Presolar Stardust Grains

Oct 12, 2021 by News Staff

An international team of scientists has analyzed a diverse set of presolar grains with the goal of realizing their true stellar origins. Palmerini et al....

Proximity to Sun’s Magnetic Field Determines Composition of Rocky Planets, Study Says

Jul 2, 2021 by News Staff

Terrestrial planets (Mercury, Venus, Earth, and Mars) are differentiated into three layers: a metallic core, a silicate shell (mantle and crust), and a...

PAH molecules overlaid on the Taurus Molecular Cloud, a large blue-white cloud made of gas and dust with large and small stars of varying luminosities interspersed throughout. Aromatic molecule structures shown in order from left to right: 1-cyanonaphthalene, 1-cyano-cyclopentadiene, HC11N, 2-cyanonaphthalene, vinylcyanoacetylene, 2-cyano-cyclopentadiene, benzonitrile, E-cyanovinylacetylene, HC4NC, propargylcyanide. Image credit: M. Weiss / Harvard & Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics.

Meteoritic Polymers of Glycine Shed Light on Pre-Solar Space Chemistry

Jun 30, 2021 by News Staff

Asteroid material in chondritic Vigarano class alteration type 3 (CV3) meteorites provide a good record of complex chemistry present when or before our...

This SEM image shows a polished thin section of Asuka 12236. The section is about 1 cm (a third of an inch) across. Most of the bright grains in the image are iron-nickel-metal and/or iron-sulfide. The gray is mostly silicate, with the darker gray areas more magnesium-rich, while the lighter gray areas are more iron-rich. The roundish objects, and some fragments of them, that tend to contain most of the small, bright metal grains are called chondrules, which formed as molten droplets. They are set in a very fine-grained matrix, which is where the organic compounds and presolar grains are found. Image credit: Carnegie Institution for Science / Conel M. O’D. Alexander.

Researchers Find Extraterrestrial Amino Acids in Antarctic Meteorite

Aug 31, 2020 by News Staff

A team of astrobiologists from NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center and the Carnegie Institution for Science has found a wide diversity of amino acids...

A piece of the enstatite chondrite meteorite Sahara 97096. Image credit: Christine Fieni / Laurette Piani / French National Museum of Natural History.

Earth’s Water Came from Enstatite Chondrite-Like Asteroids, Study Suggests

Aug 28, 2020 by News Staff

A type of meteorite called an enstatite chondrite has similar isotopic composition to terrestrial rocks and thus may be representative of the material...

An artist’s conception of a potential solar companion, which theorists believe was developed in the Sun’s birth cluster and later lost. If proven, the solar companion theory would provide additional credence to theories that the Oort Cloud formed as we see it today, and that Planet Nine was captured rather than formed in place. Image credit: M. Weiss.

Early Solar System May Have Had Two Suns

Aug 19, 2020 by News Staff

In a paper published in the Astrophysical Journal Letters, Harvard University astrophysicists Avi Loeb and Amir Siraj show that an equal-mass stellar companion...

Model of the hemolithin molecule: space-filling mode (top), ball and stick (center), enlarged view of iron, oxygen and lithium termination (bottom). White = H; orange = Li; gray = C; blue = N; red = O and green = Fe. Hydrogen bonds are shown by dotted lines. Image credit: McGeoch et al, arXiv: 2002.11688.

Researchers Find Extraterrestrial Protein in Meteorite Acfer 086

Mar 26, 2020 by Sergio Prostak

A research team led by Harvard University scientist Julie McGeoch has found a never-before-seen protein inside a meteorite called Acfer 086. A sample of...

This composite image of Ultima Thule was compiled from data obtained by NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft as it flew by the object on January 1, 2019. The image combines enhanced color data (close to what the human eye would see) with detailed high-resolution panchromatic pictures. Image credit: NASA / Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory / Southwest Research Institute / Roman Tkachenko.

Three New Studies Provide More Complete Picture of Physical Nature of Kuiper Belt Object Arrokoth

Feb 18, 2020 by News Staff

On January 1, 2019, NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft flew past the Kuiper Belt object (KBO) Arrokoth — provisional designation 2014 MU69, previously...

Curious Marie is a sample of the Allende meteorite, which fell in northern Mexico in February 1969. The white, fuzzy-looking features in this fragment are calcium-aluminum-rich inclusions -- some of the first solids to condense in the Solar System. Image credit: The Planetary Society.

Researchers Find Presolar Grains in Unusual Inclusion from Allende Meteorite

Jan 29, 2020 by News Staff

Scientists from Washington University, St. Louis, Caltech and the University of Chicago have found presolar grains — tiny bits of solid interstellar...

Scanning electron microscope image of the 6.2-billion-year-old grain of silicon carbide from the Murchison meteorite. Image credit: Heck et al, doi: 10.1073/pnas.1904573117.

Scientists Find 7-Billion-Year-Old Stardust in Murchison Meteorite

Jan 13, 2020 by News Staff

A team of researchers from the United States, Switzerland and Australia has found 4.6 to 7-billion-year-old presolar grains of silicon carbide (SiC) in...

Merging neutron stars. Image credit: Mark Garlick, University of Warwick.

Violent Collision of Two Neutron Stars Occurred near Pre-Solar Nebula 4.6 Billion Years Ago

May 5, 2019 by News Staff

According to new research, a nearby binary neutron-star merger gave birth to 0.3% of the Earth’s heaviest elements, including gold, platinum and uranium;...