Stars in a pellet

摘要

A team of researchers has used a high-power laser, a tiny hollow plastic pellet and silicon foil to reproduce the X-rays emitted by stars. Shinsuke Fujioka of Osaka University in Japan and his colleagues fired 12 green laser beams at the pellet, compressing and heating it. As the plastic became superheated, silicon atoms near the pellet were ionized, releasing X-rays resembling those seen in two distant binary star systems, where one star is orbiting another.