Astronomical sensation fossils prove supernova near Earth - N24

scientists of the Technical University of Munich have provided the first evidence of a stellar explosion near the Earth. In fossils they found a chemical element that occurs only in a supernova.

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Munich for the first time researchers have discovered traces of a star explosion in fossil bacteria. In the remains of microbes, the team from the Technical University of Munich (TUM) was a radioactive isotope of iron, formed only in the so-called supernovae. It is the first proven biological signature of a stellar explosion, shared with the TUM in Garching near Munich. According to analyzes of the old star is about 2.2 million years before exploding -. Around the time when modern humans arose

supernovae, the stars spin in a giant explosion much of their mass into space. The radioactive iron isotope 60 Fe is formed almost exclusively in such stellar explosions. The scientists found the isotope in magnetite crystals of a bacterial species that lives in the upper sediment layers of the oceans. The bacteria accumulate iron in tiny magnetite crystals in order to orient themselves so that the Earth’s magnetic field.

TU Astro nuclear physicist Shawn Bishop had espoused the thesis: If the earth would ever come in contact with a supernova, it would have to be found in the fossil remains of bacterial Fe-60th To test this hypothesis, Bishop and his colleagues examined 1.7 million to 3.3 million years old, part of a deep-sea drill core from the Pacific Ocean.

took samples from different depths, which originate from different times. From these they broke chemically fossil bacteria remains out – and thus the supernova iron

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To confirm the previous results on the supernova tracks, Bishop and his team prepare now before the analysis of a second drill core with a tenfold amount of fossil bacteria. They want to find out more precisely how old are the Fe-60 residues – and has thus occurred when the supernova. , Researchers from information reported by TU in 2004 SuperNova-iron finds at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean.