Quasars

Quasars

By kandf

  • Development of Radio Astronomy

    Before Radio Astronomy, what we knew about the solar system was limited to objects that were visible. Until we could listen to radio waves.

  • First radio waves picked up leading to discovery

    Astronomers Allan Sandage and Thomas Matthews discovered a blue object that resembled a star, that sends out particularly intense radio waves.

  • Officialy discovered

    Officialy discovered
    Maarten Schmidt proved what the radio waves were exactly, when he spotted a similar pattern. It was named Quasar because of the attempt to pronounce the acronym QASR.

  • Einstein's General Theory of Relativity confirmed by double quasar

    In 1979 the gravitational lens effect predicted by Einstein's General Theory of Relativity was confirmed observationally for the first time with images of the double quasar.

  • Hubble Telescope Observes Distant Quasar

    The Hubble telescope spotted a faint quasar billions of light years away from earth. This peticular quasar, is speeding away from Earth at around 150,000 miles/second and is 6 million times fainter in appearance than a bright star.

  • Farthest Quasar Found

    Using a 200-inch telescope astronomers detected a quasar farther away from earth than ever seen before. It is about 12 billion light years away.

  • May be the largest structure in the observable universe

    Across 600 million light years, quasars and galaxies have clustered to create what astronomers believe may be the largest structure in the observable universe.

  • How does a Quasar ignite?

    In 2006, astronomers using the Chandra X-ray Observatory found out how Quasars turn on. The study in 2006 found that an interaction/collision between two galaxies has gas go toward the central region of the crash, where it triggers a huge burst of star formation. It also provides the fuel for the growth of a central black hole. The inflow of gas into the black hole releases so much energy, a quasar is born.

  • Citations

    <"1963: Maarten Schmidt Discovers Quasars." Everyday Cosmology. Observatories of the Carnegie Institution for Science, n.d. Web. 12 Dec. 2013>.
    <"Aug. 5, 1962: First Quasar Discovered." Conde Nast Digital, 05 Aug. 2010. Web. 12 Dec. 2013>.
    <Comins, Neil F. "Discovering the Universe: From the Stars to the Planets." Google Books. N.p., n.d. Web. 12 Dec. 2013>.
    <"Hubble Telescope Observes Distant Quasar." New York Times 5 Nov. 1990. Science in Context. Web. 12 Dec. 2013.>

  • Workcited cont.

    <"Bigger than a breadbox, or anything else." New York Times 9 Jan. 2001: A1. Science in Context. Web. 13 Dec. 2013.>
    <"SCIENCE WATCH; Farthest Quasar Found." New York Times 27 Aug. 1991. Science in Context. Web. 12 Dec. 2013.>
    <"Quasars." World of Earth Science. Ed. K. Lee Lerner and Brenda Wilmoth Lerner. Detroit: Gale, 2007. Science in Context. Web. 12 Dec. 2013.>
    <Trimble, VIrginia, and Lodewijk Woltjer. "Quasars at 25." Science 234 (1986): 155+. Science in Context. Web. 12 Dec. 2013.>