VLA Reveals Spectacular "Halos" of Spiral Galaxies

[n2doc]

A study of spiral galaxies seen edge-on has revealed that "halos" of cosmic rays and magnetic fields above and below the galaxies' disks are much more common than previously thought.

An international team of astronomers used the Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array (VLA) to study 35 edge-on spiral galaxies at distances from 11 million to 137 million light-years from Earth. The study took advantage of the ability of the VLA, following completion of a decade-long upgrade project, to detect radio emission much fainter than previously possible.

"We knew before that some halos existed, but, using the full power of the upgraded VLA and the full power of some advanced image-processing techniques, we found that these halos are much more common among spiral galaxies than we had realized," said Judith Irwin, of Queen's University in Canada, leader of the project.

Spiral galaxies, like our own Milky Way, have the vast majority of their stars, gas, and dust in a flat, rotating disk with spiral arms. Most of the light and radio waves seen with telescopes come from objects in that disk. Learning about the environment above and below such disks has been difficult.

"Studying these halos with radio telescopes can give us valuable information about a wide range of phenomena, including the rate of star formation within the disk, the winds from exploding stars, and the nature and origin of the galaxies' magnetic fields," said Theresa Wiegert, also of Queen's University, lead author of a paper in the Astronomical Journal reporting the team's findings. The paper provides the first analysis of data from all 35 galaxies in the study.

more
https://public.nrao.edu/news/pressreleases/galaxy-halos

[trusty elf]

1. Endlessly fascinating

Thanks, n2doc