3D Printing Meets Astrophysics: Deciphering the Structure of Eta Carinae's Homunculus Nebula and Colliding Stellar Winds
Tom Madura
NASA
Additive manufacturing or '3D printing' has the potential to improve the
astrophysical community's ability to visualize, understand, interpret, and
communicate important scientific results. In this talk, I summarize recent
efforts to use 3D printing to understand in detail the 3D structure of a
complex astrophysical system, the supermassive (~120 M_Sun) binary star Eta
Carinae and its surrounding bipolar "Homunculus" nebula. Using mapping
observations of molecular hydrogen line emission obtained with the ESO Very
Large Telescope, we obtained a full 3D model of the Homunculus, allowing us
to 3D print, for the first time, a detailed replica of a nebula. Our results
reveal important deviations from the overall axisymmetric bipolar morphology
of the nebula and two new structures that protrude from each main nebula
lobe. I discuss how these features relate to the central interacting binary
stars and what they imply for theories of the formation of the Homunculus. I
also present 3D prints of output from a supercomputer simulation of the
colliding stellar winds in the highly eccentric binary located near the
center of the Homunculus. These 3D prints, the first of their kind, reveal
previously unknown 'finger-like' structures at orbital phases shortly after
periastron (when the two stars are closest to each other) that protrude
radially outward from the spiral wind-wind collision region. We speculate
that these fingers are related to instabilities that arise at the interface
between the slow, dense post-shock primary-star wind and the faster,
less-dense companion-star wind. The success of our work and easy
identification of previously unrecognized physical features highlight the
important role 3D printing can play in the visualization and understanding
of complex 3D time-varying astrophysical phenomena.
Date: | Jeudi, le 26 février 2015 |
Heure: | 11:30 |
Lieu: | Université de Montréal |
| Pavillon Roger-Gaudry, local D-460 |
Contact: | Noel Richardson / Tony Moffat |
|