太空惊现“上帝之手”(在线收听

   It looks like a hand of God reaching out into the cosmos, but NASA says the display is caused by a young and powerful pulsar.

  Taken by NASA's Chandra X-ray observatory from it's orbiting 360 miles above the Earth, the recently released photo of Pulsar B1509 captures the X-Ray nebula in a state shaped like a human hand.
  "The finger-like structures are apparently caused by energizing knots of material in a neighboring gas cloud," NASA said.
  NASA estimates the shape spans 150 light years, but it is caused by a dense neutron star that's just 12 miles in diameter.
  Astronomers believe B1509 is roughly 1,700 years old and is located 17,000 light years from Earth.
  继早前拍到的上帝之眼,科学家日前再拍摄到上帝之手的太空照片。一团幽影似的蓝云形成了一个张开的大拇指和几只手指,抓住一块燃烧的煤。
  据香港《大公报》报道,这幅令人震惊的照片,是由美国太空总署的钱德拉X光观测仪拍到的,该观测仪在地球表面上空360英里处绕着轨道运行。
  该照片令人想起螺旋星云的照片,螺旋星云的蓝色中心被白云包围着,并被人们冠以一个绰号:“上帝之眼”。
  这只“上帝之手”是由超新星爆炸引起的。爆炸后该星迅速形成一颗12英里宽的脉冲星,该脉冲星深隐于手腕上的白团里。
  原文地址:http://www.tingroom.com/listen/essay/163985.html