The opening years of the Fourth Century saw work begin on St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome, and the astronomer Pappus of Alexandria wrote details of his observation of an eclipse of the Sun. In the southern hemisphere, a star was seen erupting within a small, fuzzy patch of the night sky.
Unfortunately, no records survived telling of this celestial event south of the equator. However, astronomers have now turned the mighty gaze of the Hubble Space Telescope to examine the remnants of this titanic explosion, called 1E 0102.2–729. By studying the cloud of gas and dust left behind, astronomers hope to piece together the story of the eruption that created this magnificent nebula.
1E 0102.2–7219 — Charming name. Rolls off the tongue…
The eruption forming the nebula was seen on Earth 1,700 years ago, but the explosion was not recognized by astronomers until recently. Seen in the Small Magellanic Cloud (a satellite galaxy of our Milky Way 200,000 light years from Earth), this nebula was first seen, in X-ray light, by NASA’s Einstein Observatory.
By studying images of 1E 0102.2–7219 taken by the Hubble Space Telescope 10 years apart, astronomers were able to see how the nebula changed over time.
Knots within the nebula move at different speeds and directions from the center of the blast, at average velocities of 3.2 million kph (almost two million MPH). At that speed, it would be possible to travel from the Earth to the Moon and back in just 15 minutes.
[Read:
]Earlier studies of 1E 0102.2–7219 concluded the blast was seen on Earth between 2000 and 1000 years before our time. But, this new study examined the 22 fastest knots within the nebula, finding the nebula formed 1,700 years before our time.