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'Hand of God' Spotted by NASA Space Telescope (Photo)
Space.com ^ | January 09, 2014 02:45pm ET | By Tanya Lewis, Staff Writer

Posted on 01/10/2014 6:32:10 AM PST by Red Badger

Religion and astronomy may not overlap often, but a new NASA X-ray image captures a celestial object that resembles the "Hand of God."

The cosmic "hand of God" photo was produced when a star exploded and ejected an enormous cloud of material, which NASA's Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array, or NuSTAR, glimpsed in high-energy X-rays, shown in blue in the photo. NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory had imaged the green and red parts previously, using lower-energy X-rays.

"NuSTAR's unique viewpoint, in seeing the highest-energy X-rays, is showing us well-studied objects and regions in a whole new light," NuSTAR telescope principal investigator Fiona Harrison, of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, said in a statement.

The new image depicts a pulsar wind nebula, produced by the dense remnant of a star that exploded in a supernova. What's left behind is a pulsar, called PSR B1509-58 (B1509 for short), which spins around 7 times per second blowing a wind of particles into material ejected during the star's death throes.

As these particles interact with nearby magnetic fields, they produce an X-ray glow in the shape of a hand. (The pulsar is located near the bright white spot in the image but cannot be seen itself, NASA officials said.)

Scientists aren't sure whether the ejected material actually assumes the shape of a hand, or whether its interaction with the pulsar's particles is just making it appear that way.

"We don't know if the hand shape is an optical illusion," Hongjun An, of McGill University in Montreal, said in a statement. "With NuSTAR, the hand looks more like a fist, which is giving us some clues."

The red cloud appearing at the fingertips is a separate structure called RCW 89. The pulsar's wind may be heating the cloud to produce the low-energy X-ray glow, astronomers believe.

The X-ray energies seen by NuSTAR range from 7 to 25 kiloelectron volts, or keV, whereas the energies seen by Chandra range from 0.5 to 2 keV.

The Hand of God is an example of pareidolia, the psychological phenomenon of perceiving familiar shapes in random or vague images. Other common forms of pareidolia include seeing animals or faces in clouds, or the man in the moon. Despite its supernatural appearance, the Hand of God was produced by natural astrophysical phenomena. - See more at: http://www.space.com/24225-hand-of-god-photo-nasa-telescope.html#sthash.pDwCLJzJ.dpuf


TOPICS: Culture/Society
KEYWORDS: astronomy; hubble; space; telescope
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To: needmorePaine

21 posted on 01/10/2014 8:06:03 AM PST by Red Badger (Proud member of the Zeta Omicron Tau Fraternity since 2004...................)
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To: Phillyred

Looks more like the Hand of Jesus reaching for His CROWN He’s about to put on........................


22 posted on 01/10/2014 8:07:13 AM PST by Red Badger (Proud member of the Zeta Omicron Tau Fraternity since 2004...................)
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To: Celtic Conservative

Why is it always Mary? Why is it never Queen Elizabeth or Joan of Arc or Hillary Clinton?.........................


23 posted on 01/10/2014 8:09:48 AM PST by Red Badger (Proud member of the Zeta Omicron Tau Fraternity since 2004...................)
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To: apillar
Lol! That was by far the best scene in what was otherwise a stinker of a movie....

Yep. However, the "episodic re-edit" removes most of the stink. It really does work better in the original TV format of four acts plus an epilogue. A lot of extraneous stuff was excised to pare it down to one hour.

24 posted on 01/10/2014 9:29:36 AM PST by Charles Martel (Endeavor to persevere...)
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To: Red Badger

God’s faceplam.


25 posted on 01/10/2014 10:58:08 AM PST by windcliff
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To: Red Badger

26 posted on 01/10/2014 10:59:01 AM PST by dfwgator
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To: windcliff

faceplam?...............

27 posted on 01/10/2014 11:18:49 AM PST by Red Badger (Proud member of the Zeta Omicron Tau Fraternity since 2004...................)
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To: Red Badger

God’s revenge for me trying to be witty.


28 posted on 01/10/2014 12:09:16 PM PST by windcliff
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To: Red Badger

That doesn’t look like a hand to me. It looks more like a face with a crown of thorns.


29 posted on 01/10/2014 4:16:01 PM PST by Windflier (To anger a conservative, tell him a lie. To anger a liberal, tell him the truth.)
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To: Red Badger; brytlea; cripplecreek; decimon; bigheadfred; KoRn; Grammy; married21; steelyourfaith; ..

Thanks Red Badger, looks like Caspar the Too-Friendly (STD infected) Ghost, extra to APoD.


30 posted on 01/11/2014 5:21:48 AM PST by SunkenCiv (http://www.freerepublic.com/~mestamachine/)
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To: GrandJediMasterYoda

31 posted on 01/11/2014 5:57:47 AM PST by hattend (Firearms and ammunition...the only growing industries under the Obama regime.)
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To: SunkenCiv
Hand of God?

I see an angel, white robes, swirling gold mantle, head thrown back, arms raised holding a blob of red fire.

Either that or God has three fingers and a thumb...


32 posted on 01/11/2014 8:17:03 AM PST by null and void (It is as if they all had one head. Too bad they don't all have one neck.)
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To: Red Badger

NASA says Hand of God.

I’m surprised they didn’t, as part of their outreach program, say hand of allah...


33 posted on 01/11/2014 8:21:20 AM PST by null and void (It is as if they all had one head. Too bad they don't all have one neck.)
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