γ-ray Bursts Contd ..

Yeah!! Ur guess was right. It met the same end.

Many believed in neutron star theory. But some didn’t. They argued on the basic observation that the rays are coming from all the different directions. This is only possible if our solar system is at the center of galaxy, which is not true. We all know that our solar system very near to the edge of the Milky Way and such a uniform distribution of rays is not at all possible.

But there is also another problem. If we believe that these rays are coming from different parts of the universe, then it means the end of Einstein’s famous equation. This is because none of the stars we see now could produce such an energetic γ-ray Bursts. Could Einstein be wrong???

May be….. But whole of our physics depends on his theory and if it is wrong, it would set a serious blow to the world of physics. But the fact still remains that the distribution of γ-ray are spread through out the galactic plane. So these rays are definitely coming from different galaxies. So is there an explosion which could break E=mc2???

To make sure that these γ-ray’s are coming from other galaxies, the best thing is to find out the star from where these rays are emerging from. γ-ray bursts doesn’t produce any visible light. But when γ-ray moves through the gas in the universe, they get heated up and lighten up. If we can get some such light, the suspense could be broken.

Very similar to a common day on which u are reading this, γ-ray bursts was picked up by the satellite and all the telescopes in the world are motioned in the direction of the rays. And Bingo!! They found a tiny hint of light.

Red-Shift is a mechanism that is used by the astronomers to find out the distance of the star from earth. The more red the star is, the more far it is. By using this red-shift mechanism they found that the rays are coming from 10 billion light years, at the edge of the universe.

This confirmed that the bursts are happening at different parts of the galaxy. Does this actually prove Einstein is wrong?

Probably No!! Martin Reese, a famous astronaut came to rescue. He proposed a theory which is very simple and fits perfectly in to the situation.

The basic assumption which we made was when ever an explosion occurs it sprays out the energy equally in all directions. According to Martin, this is not true. When a γ-ray burst happens, it sprays out the energy in a very narrow path in only two different directions. And hence the mystery was resolved.

But one question still remained!! What is the reason for these bursts?? Martin and many other scientists looked in to this issue and at last came up with a theory.

Stellar Nurseries is a place where stars are born. The normal age of a star is millions of years. But as the size of the star is bigger its life time also goes down. For example a star which is 100 times bigger than our Sun will not live more than a hundred years. Some stars are so big that they die in a few years after they were born.

But why do stars die?? Stars do require some fuel to burn. And for massive stars, considering it size, the fuel gets completed in a few years and they die. This is the reason for the death of the star.

Hypernova has been used to refer to an exceptionally large star that collapses at the end of its lifespan. The core of the hypernova collapses directly into a black hole and two extremely energetic jets of plasma are emitted from its rotational poles at nearly the speed of light. These jets emit intense gamma rays, and are the most candidate explanations for gamma ray bursts.

Many scientists are still experimenting about these bursts. And may be some day they can prove the reason behind these bursts. Lets wait for the day. :-)