What are quasars???????
Quasars are compact, quasi-stellar objects. They are very bright and luminous, trillion of times brighter than the sun. A quasar is a whole galaxy that shoots out a beam of energy from its north and south poles. A quasar is powered by a supermassive black hole. When matter falls into the black hole, the high speed spinning causes some of that matter to be ejected as beams of energy. http://ksjtracker.mit.edu/wp-content/upl... A quasar is part of a larger groups of galaxies called AGN galaxies (Active Galactic Nuclei). This basically means the center of the galaxy is active, which is what a quasar is. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quasar
What is a quasar?
Has anyone ever figured out, exactly, what quasars are? Are they just galaxies with highly energetic radio jets in their cores, or are they something entirely different? Also, where can I find a book on active galactic nuclei that's written for lay persons, not astrophysics majors?
A certain quasar...?
...recedes from Earth at 0.55 c. A jet of material ejected from the quasar toward the Earth moves at 0.13 c relative to the quasar. Find the speed of the ejected material relative to Earth. Answer in units of c. I put this problem into perspective, having the quasar moving away from Earth, while shooting something out the back of it, back towards Earth. So we have the speed of the quasar, then the speed of the material relative to the quasar, moving toward the Earth. I know time dilation must be a factor in this problem, but I can't seem to grasp what numbers I would have to plug in. Any help would be appreciated.
How can science prove that Quasars actually exist?
Because we can look at them and say, “yup, that’s a quasar”. You can see quasars with a good amateur telescope.The word “quasar” comes from Quasi-Stellar Object (QSO). The first were discovered from radio observations, and when we were able to observe them visually, they were further than all but the most distant galaxies, yet appeared to be point-like objects, similar to stars.That quasars exist is indisputable, what they are has been a matter of research for decades. Today, it is pretty clear they are galaxies with active super-massive black holes in their core. We have direct images of quasars with a galaxy around them:
What is the science behind a quasar?
They were first spotted as star-like objects with unusual spectral lines.Someone spotted that these lines made sense if they had gigantic red shifts. Implying that they were enormously distant and enormously bright.This was disputed, with theories of ‘tired light’ used as alternatives. Or they might indicate some new physics at work. But majority opinion soon decided that they were matter falling into gigantic Black Holes at the heart of distant galaxies.This was supported by better images that showed them as the bright cores of galaxies, or sometimes two merging galaxies.It is also believed that they are the same things as Radio Galaxies and Blazars, seen from different angles.
What happened to all the quasars?
Quasars are super massive black holes at the center of young galaxies that are devouring gas and dust and then shooting off large amounts of radiation into space. That's why we can see a quasar. Once, the super massive black hole has sucked up the remaining surrounding gas, it is no longer a quasar, but instead a super massive black hole at the center of a galaxy. Our own galaxy would have a quasar if the super massive black hole at the center was still consuming large amounts of gas and dust, but it's not. Instead, there's a radius of empty space between the black hole and the galaxy that surrounds it. The reason why we only see quasars in young galaxies is because this is how young galaxies start. They start with a black hole that has condensed in the center of a large gas cloud and then that black hole consumes it's immediate surrounding gas, which causes the large gamma ray bursts and thus we call them quasars. This sparks off star formation in the surrounding gas, which eventually forms into galaxies as we know of today. The black hole becomes super massive and eventually consumes all of it's mediate surrounding gas and then becomes relatively quiet and no longer a quasar. This is why older more developed galaxies don't have quasars at their centers.
How can we determine the age of any object such as quasar? What else can we measure, aside from its gravitational effect on some other object?
That’s a very complex question and the answers are not definitive. Sometimes we are totally guessing how far things are away. For instance, pulsars are so far away they prove Big Bang is a ridiculous creationist theory only a brain dead idiot would believe. That said, Pulsars provide some indication of distance and, if you are good at math, you can get some idea of how long it took for the signals to get here by watching what they do when things like the Sun are nearby… bending light and stuff. Wish I could help you more but I work at the sub-atomic level of reality. As below, so above… I figure.