The Astronomers team led by the Indian Astrophysical Institute (IIA) and their co -workers have a breakthrough in understanding how space dust grains are aligned with the magnetic field of the galaxy.
The grains of dust, usually several micrometers in size and composed mainly of silicates and carbon material, are found throughout the interstellar medium in the Milky Way and other galaxies.
These small particles play a key role in a wide range of astrophysical processes, including the formation of stars and planets.
The Ministry of Science and Technology said that this breakthrough of astronomers provides the strongest observational evidence for long-theoretized ways in which dust cope with magnetic fields in our galaxy.
They focused on a massive infrared dark cloud creating a star G34.43+0.24, located around 12,000 light -years in the milk path.
Using the Polarimeter Pol-2 on the James Maxwell telescope, scientists mapped the dust in this star forming a kindergarten with magnetic fields.
The study found that the observational evidence for three different mechanisms of equalization operating in a single cosmic cloud, namely rat, rat-D and M-Rain.
Rat-A means aligning a radiation torque in which non-aspirical grains exposed to anisotropic radiation experience radiation rotating moments-which cause them to spin and correspond to the direction of the surrounding magnetic fields.
RAT-D is a disturbance of radiation torque in which large dust grains revolve so quickly under strong radiation from massive and light protostars built inside the core that they are disturbed into smaller fragments, reducing the efficiency of grain alignment and thus reducing the polarization fraction.
M-Rain means a mechanism of alignment of radiation torque magnetically elevated, in which the grain alignment efficiency is increased by a strong magnetic relaxation strength of grains, resulting in a higher percentage of polarization.
“This shows that the grains react differently depending on their environment-sometimes they are perfectly equal, sometimes they break under stress and sometimes become very effective in watching magnetic fields,” the department said.
He added that by showing how these mechanisms play in real space, astronomers now have stronger magnetic field mapping tools through the galaxy.
“This work strengthens observational support for well -established popular grain alignment theories and significantly contributes to long -term efforts to understand the precise grain leveling mechanisms,” said Saikhom Pravash, manager and PhD researcher on IIA and Pondicherry University.
Published – September 20, 2025 17:55
