Mystifying Hot Gas in Milky Way Galaxy Decoded: Scientists Unveil its Source

Bangalore/New Delhi, March 15 (IANS/NWR) - An international team of scientists from India and the US has cracked the code behind a mysterious hot gas surrounding our galaxy. The breakthrough was achieved through a collaborative study involving Raman Research Institute (RRI), Indian Institutes of Technology (IIT-Palakkad), and Ohio State University.

According to researchers, fiery hot gas detected around 10 million degrees Kelvin is not coming from a single source but two - emissions of X-rays and absorption of gas in distant quasars. The origin of the emitting component was found to be a puffed-up region located near the stellar disc of the Milky Way galaxy.

"We have discovered that the continuous star formation at various regions across the disk leads to the explosion of massive stars as supernovae, which in turn heats up the surrounding gas and enriches it with elements synthesized within these stars," said Mukesh Singh Bisht, doctoral student at RRI.

As this turbulent gas swirls violently around and gets swept into the surrounding medium or cool down and fall back onto the disc, it releases its contents of elements. These nuclei are multiples of helium nuclei and point to nuclear reactions occurring in stellar cores, the researchers noted.

According to Bisht, these findings will shed more light on stellar processes happening inside our galaxy, "the fiery gas is also abundant with alpha-elements such as sulphur, magnesium, neon which are a vital clue to our understanding the stellar core."

It is worth noting that while quasars have been discovered to be emitting X-rays in directions all around the Milky Way Galaxy, and absorbing elements in distant quasars, previous research had linked them together.