Herschel Spectroscopy of Future Supernova

davecl writes "ESA's Herschel Space Telescope has released its first spectroscopic results. These include observations of VYCMa, a star 50 times as massive as the sun and soon to become a supernova, as well as a nearby galaxy, more distant colliding starburst galaxies and a comet in our own solar system. The spectra show more lines than have ever been seen in these objects in the far-infrared and will allow astronomers to work out the detailed chemistry and physics behind star and planet formation as well as the last stages of stellar evolution before VYCMa's eventual collapse into a supernova. More coverage is available at the Herschel Mission Blog, which I run."

Re:Herschel Spectroscopy of Past Supernova

[spineboy]

Yes, but it WILL have gone kablooey - which is the cool part.

Actually what the cool part is, is that they are detecting so many compounds (complex organic ones too) in the stars ejected gas shell. They think that this type of star seeds/forms other stars and planets with higher weight elements and complex compounds. Another step in the understanding how life came about.

SPIRE

[digitrev]

Heh. Nice to see results from this. I just did some work related to SPIRE in Summer 08. Namely, some nonlinearities with regards to bolometers (the type of detector used on SPIRE). Just some coop work, but it's kind of nice to see a project you worked on get some nice results. Unfortunately, you can't see the effects of my work because they only show up as second and third harmonics, and the data here doesn't show enough to see it.

Re:Just think about it..

[digitalunity]

I've considered that many times before. If you could instantly travel 60 million light years from earth and take a massive telescope with you, dinosaurs would be visible!

Unrealistic for a lot of reasons, I know. It's still fun to think about though.