sciencecenter:The largest, oldest body of water resides in spaceAnd man, it’s really old and reallll
sciencecenter:The largest, oldest body of water resides in spaceAnd man, it’s really old and reallllly big. Scientists merrily hunting for quasars found this particular one 12 billion light years away - meaning the light from the quasar left it 12 billion years ago - meaning the cloud of water has existed for the vast majority of the existence of the universe.And did I mention the water cloud is big? As NASA reports, it contains 140 trillion times the amount of water in the Earth’s oceans. It’s so big that it could supply every person on Earth with 20,000 Earth-sized planets’ worth of water, or 28 galaxies, each with 400 billion stars that each have 10 planets, with water. So where did all that water come from? As Charles Fishman explains,The water is in a cloud around a huge black hole that is in the process of sucking in matter and spraying out energy (such an active black hole is called a quasar), and the waves of energy the black hole releases make water by literally knocking hydrogen and oxygen atoms together.That’s well and interesting, but I’ll be honest, this is the part of the article that really caught my attention: “Scientists have found the biggest and oldest reservoir of water ever—so large and so old, it’s almost impossible to describe.”Is that a challenge? How about the “mighty massive black hole’s phlegm space sphere”? Or “cloudy with a chance of a crap ton of water” or “waterworld” or “APM 08279+5255” (oh wait, that’s the boring name NASA came up with). I, of course, welcome your suggestions.h/t we-rise-togetherQuick LinksQuasar - WikipediaThe Big Thirst - Fast Company -- source link