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Graphic titled “XUE 1 Irradiated Protoplanetary Disk, MIRI Medium-Resolution Spectroscopy” shows a graph of brightness on the y-axis versus wavelength of light in microns on the x-axis. An arrow pointing down along the y-axis reads “dimmer;” arrow pointing up reads “brighter.” (There are no values or tick marks on the y-axis.) The x-axis ranges from 4.95 microns on the left to 5.15 microns on the right, labeled in even increments of 0.05 microns. A key in the upper right corner shows that model data are plotted in orange and Webb data are plotted in white. Both the model and data are plotted as series of connected line segments. Sixteen sharp peaks (high brightness) appear in both the data and model, which align closely with each other. The peaks vary in height and are fairly evenly spaced from left to right. Each is highlighted with a dark red column. A label above reads “Carbon Monoxide, C O.” One peak appears in the data, but not in the model, and is not highlighted in red.

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Graphic titled “XUE 1 Irradiated Protoplanetary Disk, MIRI Medium-Resolution Spectroscopy” shows a graph of brightness on the y-axis versus wavelength of light in microns on the x-axis. An arrow pointing down along the y-axis reads “dimmer;” arrow pointing up reads “brighter.” (There are no values or tick marks on the y-axis.) The x-axis ranges from 4.95 microns on the left to 5.15 microns on the right, labeled in even increments of 0.05 microns. A key in the upper right corner shows that model data are plotted in orange and Webb data are plotted in white. Both the model and data are plotted as series of connected line segments. Sixteen sharp peaks (high brightness) appear in both the data and model, which align closely with each other. The peaks vary in height and are fairly evenly spaced from left to right. Each is highlighted with a dark red column. A label above reads “Carbon Monoxide, C O.” One peak appears in the data, but not in the model, and is not highlighted in red.
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Kelly Lepo (kellylepo@astrodon.social)'s status on Wednesday, 06-Dec-2023 10:07:54 JST Kelly Lepo

An interesting thing happens when you take the infrared light from an object, like this planet-forming disk, and spread out the light by wavelength into a spectrum. You sometimes get these regularly spaced peaks in brightness.
It turns out that this comes from the vibration of molecules, like carbon monoxide (CO).
1/2
📷 https://webbtelescope.org/contents/media/images/2023/152/01HFPT98RKZYQKV2YP2S6HNDZ3
#astronomy #chemistry #space

In conversation about a year ago from astrodon.social permalink