Astronomers have first seen the structure of the massive protostellar disk G358-MM1. This was reported by TASS with reference to the press service of the Ural Federal University, whose specialists took part in the work of an international group of scientists.
A protostellar accretion disk is a structure of interstellar gas that gradually contracts under the influence of gravity. When the pressure and temperature in the bowels of the cloud rises to a critical value, a thermonuclear reaction will ignite. In the early stages of evolution, such objects may have a complex structure other than spherical.
Until now, scientists did not know what structure the disks of massive protostars have. “Now we are closer to understanding this process. In fact, we were able to see and prove that the disk around a massive protostar has the structure of four spiral arms, along which matter falls onto the star,” Andrey Sobolev said., one of the authors of the work. Observations of scientists have shown that disk accretion is nonmonotonic, with bright episodic bursts, and matter is transferred along spiral formations to the inner region of the disk, from where it falls directly onto the star. For the study, a new method of “excitation wave mapping” was used, in which a burst of stellar radiation scanned the disk material, causing flashes of methanol masers. Registering such outbreaks is extremely difficult, the university noted.
The study of the structure of protostars is crucial for understanding the evolution of the universe and the solar system.
Previously, scientists have found out the origin of the pattern in the form of honeycombs in the desert.
