[HN Gopher] Astronomers observe the Radcliffe Wave oscillating
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Astronomers observe the Radcliffe Wave oscillating
Author : wglb
Score : 42 points
Date : 2024-02-23 16:25 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (phys.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (phys.org)
| eganist wrote:
| If you're wondering what the Radcliffe Wave is like I was, from
| the article:
|
| > A few years ago, astronomers uncovered one of the Milky Way's
| greatest secrets: An enormous, wave-shaped chain of gaseous
| clouds in our sun's backyard, giving birth to clusters of stars
| along the spiral arm of the galaxy we call home.
|
| Tldr: the clouds both look like a wave and move like waves too
| (analogized to wave-like motions in stadiums). Which is pretty
| neat. They speculate it's because of gravitational interactions.
|
| More: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-024-07127-3
| genman wrote:
| What they discovered is a traveling wave (like in stadiums) -
| the stars move "up and down" in relation to the "Milky Way
| gravity". They have no idea why it is happening.
| xbpx wrote:
| Clearly the Radcliffe wave is leftover vibrational energy from a
| space-time knot formed when now long extinct aliens exited the
| galaxy in a dark energy fueled artificially generated wormhole.
| Clearly.
| westbywest wrote:
| The "Soliton Wave" from TNG was very far down on the list of
| things I would have expected to see in real life.
| aaroninsf wrote:
| Idle wonder if while dark matter is not _necessary_ as said ITT,
|
| visible matter moving interacting with specific dark matter
| gravitational sources, in effect static wrt the galactic rotation
| of the visible, would explain the "origin" sought.
|
| I.e., don't need oscillation to continue, but it's a premise for
| how it got started.
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