Seeds of life may be created by cosmic shockwaves caused by stars themselves

From a couple of RPI profs:

...When stars are born, they often emit jets of matter moving at hundreds of thousands of miles per hour. The impact of these jets onto surrounding material creates an extreme and sudden disturbance. This material does not have time to react to the sudden pile-up of energy and mass. Shock waves lash out into the surrounding plasma to expel the sudden force. These shock waves spread material through space, potentially “seeding” new solar systems with chemicals that may be important for life.

“Now that we understand how fast and far these waves move in space, we can begin to understand how chemicals, including chemicals necessary for life, can be formed by shock waves and spread around the universe to form new stars, planets, and life,” Roberge said.

posted by Purp at 09:43 PM

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