Monsters in Space Space has its own set of monsters. I call them monsters because they destroy everything that gets near them, after all what is a monster but something which causes destruction and these things are great at doing it on a gigantic level. One of the biggest things in our universe which we know about is a galaxy. Astronomers are interested in studying galaxies for many different reasons, but one of these reasons is to learn more about our galaxy. Since we are inside a galaxy, the Milky Way, it is hard to get an overall picture of what is happening, but observing a similar type of galaxy is thought to be helpful in understanding our own. When we see astronomical photos of galaxies they look beautiful and peaceful, but the truth is they can also be violent. Take the galaxy known as WISE J224607.55-052734.9. This monster galaxy is tearing apart all the galaxies near it, of course when I say near it, this is a cosmological term for measuring distance. Thank goodness this galaxy is over 12 billion light years from us. It is believed there could also be rogue black holes which travel through space and are not inside a galaxy. A team of Spanish and Canadian scientists have discovered ultra-massive black holes which may be the biggest ever found. These ultra- massive black holes are still growing. Since no light escapes from a black hole according to scientists, they are very hard to detect, but we can see the material which is being drawn into them. We know they are able to attain sizes billions of times the mass of our sun and some scientists believe they can get even bigger. One of the scary things about them, besides the damage they cause, is the fact they may be more common than first thought. Even the smallest ones are from about 5 to 30 times the size of the sun. There intense gravity sucks everything toward them and rips it apart and then digests the pieces. They have no problem swallowing stars, planets and anything else which can be drawn toward them. Perhaps there are some so huge they can suck in galaxies. Some people have proposed the reason the universe is expanding so fast is there may be a gigantic black hole beyond the size of anything else which is pulling the universe toward it. Scientists have discovered what they believe to be the biggest black hole found so far. It is estimated to be 40 billion times the mass of the sun. Scientists have estimated the bigger the black hole is the bigger the jets of gas they throw off, so this fact can be used to estimate their size. Some black holes have been found to be growing faster than the galaxies which contain them meaning they eventually consume the galaxy around them. One of the scary monsters in space is a Hypernova. It is created when a supermassive star reaches the end of its life cycle and its core collapses into a black hole. This sends out jets of gamma radiation. These types of stars are said to be very rare, thank goodness, because those gamma radiation emissions destroy anything in their path which is living. It is believed by some scientists one of the extinction events in Earth’s past history may have been caused by gamma radiation from one of these giants. It was called the Ordovician-Silurian extinction events. It is said, depending on the size of the explosion, 50 to 100 light years is the closest we can safely be to one of these explosions. The good news is the closest star found which might be capable of an explosion like this is about 1,500 light years away. Neutron stars are extremely dense stars. If you could dip a teaspoon into a neutron and fill it with material from the star, the material would weigh hundreds of millions of tons. This is because the material is so compacted. It has a high gravity field so you wouldn’t want to get too close, but there is even a deadlier type of neutron star called a Magnetar. A Magnetar has incredible magnetic fields. Radiation waves from a Magnetar hit the earth in 1979. They knocked out several satellites. Biologic life is in danger from Magnetars. The magnetism is so strong it would dissolve our bodies if it hit us. What a horrible weapon this would make if it was ever developed. Our solar system is sitting in the middle of a shot gun. It is loaded with hundreds and maybe thousands of meteorites and asteroids. Each one is just waiting to be knocked out of orbit so it can head toward Earth. Earth is subject to devastation from one of these objects which could be a lot smaller than we suspect. The reason for this is the kinetic power it would pack on impact. It is thought an object about 60 miles in diameter would be able to do the job. Which is it would destroy most life and vegetation, there would probably be a few people and animals which would survive, but they would have a very hard time. Soil and dirt would be driven into the atmosphere hiding the sunlight for years and this is the light plants depend on to live. One of the monsters in our universe is our own star, the sun. It is believed the sun will someday be responsible for destroying the Earth. Most scientists believe the sun burns hydrogen atoms. These atoms are turned into helium atoms and sink to the sun’s core. Scientists believe a time will come when so many helium atoms are in the core it will shrink dramatically causing nuclear fusion to speed up. This means the sun will put out even more energy. Every billion years the sun gets 10% brighter because of this. As the sun’s energy output increases there will be an effect on earth. More water will evaporate and will go into the atmosphere. This will trap more heat and evaporation will increase in speed. Eventually the sun’s energy will turn the water molecules into hydrogen and oxygen and eventually the Earth will become a dry planet. It is estimated in another 3.5 billion years, if there is still water on Earth, the oceans will boil and the atmosphere will be stripped of moisture. Lastly, I would like to mention the fact there are rogue stars, planets and moons, not only rogue black holes. They are capable of crashing into our solar system and hitting one of the planets or moons in our system which in turn could do damage to us, or even destroy us.
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