January 27, 2014

River of Hydrogen Flowing through Space Seen with Green Bank Telescope



Using the National Science Foundation’s Robert C. Byrd GreenBank Telescope (GBT), astronomer D.J. Pisano from West Virginia University has discovered what could be a never-before-seen river of hydrogen flowing through space. This very faint, very tenuous filament of gas is streaming into the nearby galaxy NGC 6946 and may help explain how certain spiral galaxies keep up their steady pace of star formation.