MASSIVE BULGE At the Center Of the Milky Way | Should We Worry?

 astronomers struggle with one of the

 biggest mysteries of our nearby universe a discovery made over a decade ago that only now may be unraveling two bubbles of powerful and deadly gamma rays light years across emanating from the core of our galaxy welcome to Science Reads in today's article we dive deep into the fascinating mystery of the strange phenomenon astronomers call fermi bubbles they are nothing less than a completely new type of cosmic object we have never seen before they are deadly

 and we're not sure how they came to be

 the fermi gamma-ray space telescope named for architect of the nuclear age enrico fermi launched in 2008 to explore the most

 energetic form of radiation out there

 this gave astronomers a fantastic tool to study everything from jets of gas ejected from around black holes to the birth and early years of the universe two years after launch astronomers using fermi announced the startling discovery two giant gamma radiation bubbles extend above and below the plane of the milky way in both directions the bubbles are expanding at 2.2 million miles per hour or 3.5 million kilometers per hour on each side of our galactic center where they touch to form a shape reminiscent of two soccer balls balanced atop one another and they span more than half of the visible sky as doug finkbiner the harvard smithsonian center for astrophysics astronomer

 who discovered the phenomenon says

 they are something wholly new and quite exciting what we see are two gamma-ray emitting bubbles that extend 25 000 light years north and south of their galactic center finkbiner said before noting their mystery we don't fully understand their nature or origin the bubbles eluded earlier detection by astronomers studying gamma rays due to diffuse emission the reaction of other gamma rays moving at nearly light speed when they interact with light and gases in the milky way fermi researchers had to wade through this morass to make their startling discovery gamma rays are to put it mildly radical members of the electromagnetic spectrum billions of times more energetic than visible light they do not regularly reflect off objects the way light does but instead penetrate them in a destructive manner gamma radiation through the human body for example can immediately damage chromosomes and cause ionizations that wreak havoc on tissue stopping the potentially deadly rays requires several inches of dense shielding such as lead or even several feet of concrete there is good news however as few gamma rays reach us on earth's surface while our sun has a tremendous amount of the rays internally they reach its surface as much less dangerous forms of light without the toxic mixture of x-rays and gamma rays the sun does not emit them and other stars don't either gamma radiation that happens to be flying around interstellar space is from very violent and energetic events such as supernovae astronomers say the likelihood of a nearby gamma-ray burst striking earth is low

 supermassive stars in our region of space are rare and even binary systems that could potentially spark a dangerous event are not close if we were subjected to such an outburst the result will be anything from destroying a significant part of our protective atmosphere to a mass extinction event so exactly what cataclysmic and mysterious event created these enormous fermi bubbles the center of the milky way is a crazy maze of invisible and interconnected swoops of energy dominated by the mickey mouse ears of

 the fermi bubbles from end to end the two bubbles span almost 50 000 light years close to half of the diameter of the entire galaxy the enormous amount of energy it took to unleash two super giant balls of gamma rays is puzzling to astronomers but there are clues the configuration of the fermi bubbles above and below the milky way center point to a suspect our supermassive black hole we call sagittarius a at a mere 26 000 light years from earth sagittarius a is in a prime position for study and nasa's chandra x-ray observatory among others is busy doing exactly that the black hole in the center of our home has about 4 million times the mass of our sun and gas swirls around it that is heated to as much as 18 million degrees fahrenheit or 10 million degrees celsius researchers using chandra concluded that less than one percent of material initially with sagittarius a's gravitational influence actually takes the plunge past the event horizon the point of no return much of it is ejected raising the possibility of a violent event or series of events that caused our deadly twin bubbles of gamma rays which brings us back to the original question one in the universe sent these super fast bubbles of deadly radiation hurling out of the center of our galaxy supermassive black holes sometimes splash gigantic jets of ionized matter from galactic centers at near light speed this has been observed by astronomers who do not know why this happens researchers using several computer simulations determined that both the bubbles and nearby x-ray structures may have been borne by a massive shock wave propelling these jets in opposite directions the process the research team concluded would have lasted as much as a million years starting with an almost unimaginably powerful blast the shock waves would have to plow through hot gas on both sides of the galactic core as they heated and compressed to break out the hourglass structure formed and the shock waves roared into space in both directions resulting in the fermi bubbles david spurgle an astrophysicist at princeton university says the phenomenon has been seen in other galaxies whatever the energy source behind the huge bubbles may be it is connected to many deep questions in astrophysics there are theories that an unfortunate star drifted too close to sagittarius a and was torn apart the violent event released enormous levels of gravitational energy in an instant which led to the bubbles that have spread ever since some theories suggest that our supermassive black hole has nothing to do with the birth of the fermi bubbles that it is simply coincidental

 in the neighborhood of their beginning

 that perhaps dozens or hundreds of densely packed stars near the galactic core when supernova and discharge the gargantuan plumes of

 radiation and energy that form the bubbles in 2020 researchers using the e-rosita x-ray satellite made a perhaps still more exciting discovery they've found two even larger bubbles extending above and below the milky way center and they are being pushed outward by the fermi shock waves discovered a decade earlier bubbles within bubbles and the new e rositas are over 70 000 light years from end to end what this groundbreaking discovery has accomplished according to dr mathias ruskowski an astronomer at the university of michigan he's overruling the previous theory of a giant starburst as the origin of the bubbles we not only can rule out the starburst model but we can also fine-tune the parameters that are needed to produce the same images within that supermassive black hole model meaning researchers may now construct more accurate simulations of the energy release that set the enormously powerful bubbles in motion accounting for hydrodynamics gravity and cosmic rays the previous starburst origin story is kaput according to dr ellen zweibel also of the university of michigan because of the time that such an event would last she explains that the length of time into which a starburst would inject the energy that forms the bubbles is about 10 million years both the fermi and erosita bubble she says would appear completely different than they do the end result at least thus far is that researchers believe that the black hole model which theorizes an enormous explosion from sagittarius a accurately predicts the sizes of both sets of intergalactic bubbles this model also gives clues as to how supermassive black holes believed to be at the center of virtually every large galaxy interact with their hosts astronomers want to know why these black holes such as our sagittarius a grow in a controlled manner in their host galaxies instead of wildly out of control further studies of these mysterious bubbles may go far in revealing this relationship but while we may be closer to an answer concerning the origin of the fermi and erosita bubbles what's happening inside them keeps getting more and more strange researchers using the ice cube neutrino observatory a fascinating facility in

 antarctica near the south pole perched on a glacier recently discovered 10 sources of high-energy neutrinos inside the fermi bubbles translation some strange subatomic interactions are going on in the bubbles and astrophysicists can only speculate as to what they are

 so what do you think about these immense bubbles of potentially deadly radiation racing out from our milky way how much stranger is our universe getting every time we make a new discovery tell us in the comments and as always

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