Cir X-1: Jets in the Africa Nebula
Image Credit:
J. English
(U. Manitoba) &
K. Gasealahwe
(U. Cape Town),
SARAO,
MeerKAT,
ThunderKAT;
Science: K. Gasealahwe,
K. Savard
(U. Oxford)
et al.;
Text: J. English & K. Savard
How soon do jets form when a supernova gives birth to a neutron star?
The Africa Nebula provides clues.
This supernova remnant surrounds
Circinus X-1, an
X-ray emitting
neutron star and the companion star it orbits.
The image, from the
ThunderKAT collaboration on the
MeerKAT
radio telescope situated in
South Africa, shows the bright
core-and-lobe structure of
Cir X-1’s currently active
jets inside the nebula.
A mere 4600 years old, Cir X-1 could be the "Little Sister" of
microquasar
SS 433*.
However, the newly discovered bubble exiting from a ring-like hole in the upper right of the nebula, along with a ring to the bottom left, demonstrate that other jets previously existed.
Computer simulations indicate those jets formed within 100 years of the
explosion and lasted up to 1000 years.
Surprisingly, to create the observed bubble,
the jets need to be more powerful than
young neutron stars were previously thought to produce.