The space between galaxies is not only not as empty as one might believe , but it ’s actually plenteous in all the factor that make us and planets .
In a new bailiwick , an international squad of astronomers showed that O , atomic number 6 , and iron are more abundant in the blank space just around beetleweed than in the galaxy themselves . The physicist were able to bring home the bacon cue on how galaxies and their stars have evolved over cosmic time .
" Previously , we think that these heavier elements would be recycled into future generations of star and put up to building planetary systems , " enounce lead author of the study Benjamin Oppenheimer , from the University of Colorado - Boulder , in astatement . " As it turns out , galaxies are n’t very good at recycle . ”
The study , print in theMonthly Notices Of The Royal Astronomical Society , combine observations from the Cosmic Origin Spectrograph ( COS ) in CU - Boulder with 20 computer pretence of large and medium - sized galaxies .
" The noteworthy law of similarity of the galaxies in our simulations to those targeted by the COS squad enable us to render the observations with greater confidence , " said Robert Crain , a Royal Society University Research Fellow at Liverpool John Moores University , and co - author of the field .
The team aimed to assume different types of galaxies with the goal of explain why there ’s less oxygen around elliptical galaxies compared to voluted one , and chance upon that it ’s about the temperature of the circumgalactic metier ( CGM ) . The CGM around ellipticals is much hotter , attain temperatures of over 1 million kelvin , while it is only less than a third of that in spiral galaxies .
The researchers consider that the enrichment of intergalactic quad has been a constant process during the old age of the universe , and as galaxy age , they expel more and more galaxies .
" It takes monumental amounts of energy from exploding supernovae and supermassive inglorious holes to plunge all these heavy element into the CGM , " said Oppenheimer .
" This is a violent and long - endure unconscious process that can take over 10 billion years , which means that in a galaxy like the Milky Way , this extremely ionised atomic number 8 we ’re watch has been there since before the Sun was born . "
