Astronomers Want To Find Why Galaxies Are Being Killed

24-Sep-2019 | Facts and Factors

Recently, scientists have found out that in extreme regions present in the universe, galaxies are getting killed and no star formation takes place there. Scientists are trying to seek the answer for this riddle with the help of leading telescope used in large Canadian project. Researchers named the program as Virgo Environment Traced in Carbon Monoxide Survey in which they will study about the phenomenon with which galaxies are getting killed by their own environment.

The principal investigator of VERTICO lead 30 experts which will use Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA) for the mapping of molecular hydrogen which provide help in formation of new stars at Virgo Cluster.

ALMA was commissioned back in 2013 and costs a total of US$1.4 billion; it contains radio dishes in array format present at 5 kilometers above Atacama Desert, in northern Chile. It has a partnership between US, Japan, Canada, Europe, South Korea, Chile and Taiwan. ALMA is considered as the largest astronomical project on ground level and also a highly advanced wavelength telescope which was ever built and it is considered ideal to study clouds made up of cold and dense gas which gives birth to new stars and can’t be located by the use of visible light.

Big scale ALMA programs like VERTICO is designed for addressing to strategic and scientific issues which could lead to breakthrough. The location of galaxies and their interactions with the surroundings as well as with each other are considered as major factors which influence their star forming ability.

As per the scientists galaxy clusters can be considered as extreme environments present in the universe which have thousand galaxies. Due to high mass, the gravitational forces of clusters creates acceleration in galaxies at high speed which then causes superheating of plasma present between the galaxies to such a high temperature so that it glows due to production of X-ray light.

When galaxies fall, then intergalactic plasma rapidly removes gas with violent process termed as ram pressure stripping. With fuel removed for the formation of star, the galaxy gets killed and no star forms afterwards.