Scientists witness huge cosmic crash, find origins of gold

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farjean2
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Scientists witness huge cosmic crash, find origins of gold

Post by farjean2 » Mon Oct 16, 2017 10:46 am

https://www.yahoo.com/news/scientists-w ... 24492.html
The colliding stars spewed bright blue, super-hot debris that was dense and unstable. Some of it coalesced into heavy elements, like gold, platinum and uranium. Scientists had suspected neutron star collisions had enough power to create heavier elements, but weren't certain until they witnessed it.

"We see the gold being formed," said Syracuse's Brown.
Libertarian666
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Re: Scientists witness huge cosmic crash, find origins of gold

Post by Libertarian666 » Mon Oct 16, 2017 3:19 pm

farjean2 wrote:https://www.yahoo.com/news/scientists-w ... 24492.html
The colliding stars spewed bright blue, super-hot debris that was dense and unstable. Some of it coalesced into heavy elements, like gold, platinum and uranium. Scientists had suspected neutron star collisions had enough power to create heavier elements, but weren't certain until they witnessed it.

"We see the gold being formed," said Syracuse's Brown.
So now our gold is worthless? :P
farjean2
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Re: Scientists witness huge cosmic crash, find origins of gold

Post by farjean2 » Mon Oct 16, 2017 3:58 pm

Libertarian666 wrote:
farjean2 wrote:https://www.yahoo.com/news/scientists-w ... 24492.html
The colliding stars spewed bright blue, super-hot debris that was dense and unstable. Some of it coalesced into heavy elements, like gold, platinum and uranium. Scientists had suspected neutron star collisions had enough power to create heavier elements, but weren't certain until they witnessed it.

"We see the gold being formed," said Syracuse's Brown.
So now our gold is worthless? :P
I think they would have to first figure out how to generate the power of a neutron star collision without blowing up the planet. That'll probably take a while so we're probably safe in our lifetimes.
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Tyler
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Re: Scientists witness huge cosmic crash, find origins of gold

Post by Tyler » Mon Oct 16, 2017 4:00 pm

Imagine the collision of two neutron stars billions of years ago, unleashing unimaginable amounts of energy and newly forged gold atoms. They drift across the universe, eventually coalescing into small rocks and eventually large planets. Buried for eons, the gold is unearthed by curious humans who find it beautiful. All that to be lost in tragic boating accidents by PP investors. ;)
farjean2
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Re: Scientists witness huge cosmic crash, find origins of gold

Post by farjean2 » Mon Oct 16, 2017 4:37 pm

The crash, called a kilonova, generated a fierce burst of gamma rays and a gravitational wave, a faint ripple in the fabric of space and time, first theorized by Albert Einstein.

The signal arrived on Earth on Aug. 17 after traveling 130 million light-years. A light-year is 5.88 trillion miles.
So basically, if I'm understanding it correctly, it was an observation of something that happened a LOOOOONG time ago in "real time" (whatever that might be). That human beings can figure this kind of stuff out never ceases to amaze me. Only wish I was smart enough to understand it myself.
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Re: Scientists witness huge cosmic crash, find origins of gold

Post by Libertarian666 » Mon Oct 16, 2017 7:56 pm

farjean2 wrote:
The crash, called a kilonova, generated a fierce burst of gamma rays and a gravitational wave, a faint ripple in the fabric of space and time, first theorized by Albert Einstein.

The signal arrived on Earth on Aug. 17 after traveling 130 million light-years. A light-year is 5.88 trillion miles.
So basically, if I'm understanding it correctly, it was an observation of something that happened a LOOOOONG time ago in "real time" (whatever that might be). That human beings can figure this kind of stuff out never ceases to amaze me. Only wish I was smart enough to understand it myself.
It happened 130 million years ago and the gamma rays and gravitational waves from it just arrived. Both of those travel at what is commonly referred to as the "speed of light".
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Re: Scientists witness huge cosmic crash, find origins of gold

Post by PP67 » Tue Oct 17, 2017 9:50 am

130,000,000 years ago and 7,642,221,985,000,000,000,000 miles away... Dang!
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Re: Scientists witness huge cosmic crash, find origins of gold

Post by ochotona » Tue Oct 17, 2017 9:55 am

PP67 wrote:130,000,000 years ago and 7,642,221,985,000,000,000,000 miles away... Dang!
Imagine if you had a net, you could catch all the gold at it's source.
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