Astronomers Create New 3D Model of Doomed Star's Explosive Outburst (VIDEO)

The massive binary star system, Eta Carinae, exploded in an eruption that ejected at least 10 times the sun's mass and made it the second-brightest star in the sky in the middle of the 19^th century. Now, astronomers have used new observations to create the first high-resolution 3D model of this stunning and explosive event.

Eta Carinae is located about 7,500 light-years away from Earth in the southern constellation of Carina. It's actually one of the most massive binary systems that astronomers can study in details. The smaller star is about 30 times the mass of the sun, and may be as much as a million times more luminous. The primary star, in contrast, is about 90 solar masses and emits five million times the sun's energy output.

Between 1838 and 1845, this system underwent a period of unusual variability during which it briefly outshone Canopus, which is normally the second-brightest star in our skies. During this event, Eta Carinae shot a gaseous shell containing at least 10 and perhaps as much as 40 times the sun's mass into space. This material created a twin-lobed dust-filled cloud known as the Homunculus Nebula.

In order to examine this phenomenon a bit more closely, the researchers created a shape model-the first high-resolution, fully 3D model of the Homunculus Nebula. It was created using only a single emission line of near-infrared light emitted by molecular hydrogen gas.

"Our model indicates that this vast shell of gas and dust has a more complex origin than is generally assumed," said Thomas Madura, a member of the study team, in a news release. "For the first time, we see evidence suggesting that intense interactions between the stars in the central binary played a significant role in sculpting the nebula we see today."

The new shape models confirms several features identified by previous studies, including pronounced holes located at the ends of each lobe and the absence of any extended molecular hydrogen emission from a dust skirt at the center of the nebula.

"One of the questions we set out to answer with this study is whether the Homunculus contains any imprint of the star's binary nature, since previous efforts to explain its shape have assumed that both lobes were more or less identical and symmetric around their long axis," said Jose Groh, an astronomer at Geneva University. "The new features strongly suggest that interactions between Eta Carinae's stars helped mold the Homunculus."

The findings are published in the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.

Want to see the model for yourself? Check out the video below, courtesy of YouTube.