NASA's X-ray spacecraft XRISM, which stands for X-ray Imaging and Spectroscopy Mission, has clocked how fast winds are ripping from a distant galaxy bursting with star formation.
The superheated gas from this galaxy, Messier 82 (M82), flows from a region of intense stellar activity at the galaxy's heart. M82 is located around 12 million light-years away from us in the northern constellation Ursa Major and classified as a "starburst galaxy" because it is forming stars 10 times as rapidly as the Milky Way does.
XRISM will continue to observe M82, potentially helping scientists solve this puzzle while simultaneously building better models of starburst galaxies.
