'Starring' role for UCC scientist in Nasa telescope team

'Starring' role for UCC scientist in Nasa telescope team

Dr Mark Kennedy of UCC’s School of Physics featured in an international team of scientists that have been using Nasa’s Fermi Gamma-ray space telescope to examine neutron stars.

A UCC scientist has played a key role in a team using a Nasa telescope
to make exciting discoveries about one of the most "exotic" objects in the universe.

Dr Mark Kennedy of UCC’s School of Physics featured in an international team of scientists that have been using Nasa’s Fermi Gamma-ray space telescope to examine neutron stars.

The telescope was launched in 2008 by the American space agency with the aim of helping astrophysicists, scientists and observers understand the acceleration of particles in both our and other solar systems, as well as provide further detail into stars.

The team, led by Dr Colin Clark, an astrophysicist at the Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics, has uncovered fresh information when it comes to neutron stars.

The stars result from a supernova explosion of a massive star and are the smallest and densest known class in astronomy apart from black holes.

They pulse radio waves and other electromagnetic radiation — with stars that are observed with pulses labelled as pulsars.

Scientists refer to neutron stars as one of the most "exotic" objects in the entire universe.

Now, the international research team have have detected the first gamma-ray eclipses from a "spider" star system — where a pulsar is feeding on a companion.

The research could help scientists define what mass marks the dividing line between neutron stars and black holes.

Dr Clark said: “One of the most important goals for studying spider systems is to try to measure the masses of the pulsars. Pulsars are basically balls of the densest matter we can measure.

“The maximum mass they can reach constrains the physics within these extreme environments, which can’t be replicated on Earth.” 

Dr Kennedy said: “These systems are binary star systems which contain a rapidly rotating neutron star that is slowly evaporating a nearby companion star.

“This window, which involves looking for a dip in the number of detectable gamma-rays emitted by the neutron star as a companion star passes between the neutron star and us, allows us to measure the mass of the neutron star independently of previous techniques.” 

This measurement has caused a change in a long-held belief among astrophysicists when it comes to neutron stars.

Dr Kennedy explained: “Previously thought to contain a neutron star with a record-breaking mass equal to 2.4 times that of the sun, we now know because of the gamma-ray data that the actual mass is 1.8 times that of the Sun.

“This suggests significant work is required in the near future to explain why previous neutron star masses may have been so far off the mark.”

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