Well thats odd... A 450 Light Year 'Corridor' of stars

[_Dastardly_]

Found this today. A tube of stars organised perfectly straight that stretches for over 450 light years.

Dunno if it's supposed to be like that or just some thing weird with the universe

 

[ThirdNostril]

Yup there are tubes like this all over the galaxy. Good luck exploring a completely red one though

 

[Michael Brookes]

It's an artifact of observational bias. A telescope points in a direction and searches for stars (for example Kepler), you get back a lot of data about stars from that vector.

Michael

 

[evoelise]

Would this be caused by the jets from a black hole or neutron star, if enough matter is ejected from the outgoing stream could it form a formation of stars like this?

 

[DocStone]

It's an artifact of observational bias. A telescope points in a direction and searches for stars (for example Kepler), you get back a lot of data about stars from that vector.

Michael

In other words, no-one has looked at the space around the cone yet

 

[Yanaran]

It's a giant alien linear particle accelerator...

 

[Toscaner]

It's an artifact of observational bias. A telescope points in a direction and searches for stars (for example Kepler), you get back a lot of data about stars from that vector.

Michael

oh, makes sense. also discovered it a few days ago and was wondering.

does that imply that this is the actual density or is it kinda "stacked" and wrong data?

 

[Rhaedas]

Michael, any plans on if and how such observational errors will be adjusted? I know you guys are adding stuff in when things are found, but what about mistakes like this? Not directly your fault of course, just bad data in a sea of numbers, but as they tend to grow in number, it's gone past an oddity to a sign of artificialness.

 

[jhondidfool]

Science says that active black hole inside a nebula = stream of stars. That's how galaxies avtually form

 

[dannysquid]

Michael, any plans on if and how such observational errors will be adjusted? I know you guys are adding stuff in when things are found, but what about mistakes like this? Not directly your fault of course, just bad data in a sea of numbers, but as they tend to grow in number, it's gone past an oddity to a sign of artificialness.

Isn't it more that it's extremely good data in a sea of not-so-good data? Maybe I'm misunderstanding Michael's explanation.

Not sure how you'd get around this.

 

[Defacto]

It's an artifact of observational bias. A telescope points in a direction and searches for stars (for example Kepler), you get back a lot of data about stars from that vector.

Michael

Are you sure that this is the case?

Should not the procedurally generated stars fill in unobserved stars so that the galaxy is realistically even in star density and composition?

 

[Rhaedas]

Isn't it more that it's extremely good data in a sea of not-so-good data? Maybe I'm misunderstanding Michael's explanation.

Not sure how you'd get around this.

Some of the artifacts are because we don't have perfect ways of measuring distances all the time, so the estimates in those databases are just that, best guessed. Using them as actual numbers all together can give a string of stars, something that shouldn't likely happen. The stars do exist, but we're not really sure precisely how far they are (which is actually the case the farther out we look).

 

[Michael Brookes]

Isn't it more that it's extremely good data in a sea of not-so-good data? Maybe I'm misunderstanding Michael's explanation.

Not sure how you'd get around this.

That's correct.

Michael

 

[Michael Brookes]

Are you sure that this is the case?

Should not the procedurally generated stars fill in unobserved stars so that the galaxy is realistically even in star density and composition?

No- it's the other way round. The galaxy is procedurally generated and authored data overwrites those regions.

Michael

 

[_Dastardly_]

Thanks for the explanation That makes a lot of sense. Shame the background engine cant 'smooth' these areas as they stand out quite dramatically against the background.

 

[Nutter]

You should find a nebula in the middle too, went past there 3 weeks ago

 

[Defacto]

No- it's the other way round. The galaxy is procedurally generated and authored data overwrites those regions.

Michael

Yes, so if this observed patch of space matches the true star density, why wouldn't all other space, being less closely observed, instead be filled with procedural stars to account for the ones not seen?
I'm not complaining btw, I'm just wondering how the system works.

 

[Michael Brookes]

Yes, so if this observed patch of space matches the true star density, why wouldn't all other space, being less closely observed, instead be filled with procedural stars to account for the ones not seen?
I'm not complaining btw, I'm just wondering how the system works.

It doesn't necessarily mean that the density for the real stars is correct as distance data is often orders of magnitude wrong. So we use an initial mass function for the procedural generation along with a density map of the galaxy from various sources (like X-Ray maps). For general densities I think the procedural system is more accurate than the observational data for individual stars. Distant clusters in particular are a nightmare.

Michael

 

[Cargobane]

Theory says that active black hole inside a nebula = stream of stars.

Fixed...

 

[Zplintz]

Love the details. What an amazing construct ED is.