Distribution Of Supergiant Stars

if the spirals have this origin, it must follow that the stars are formed by an encounter of clouds in two very distinct processes. in the first place, and especially in the central region, the clouds encounter one another in their radial movement, and this is the phenomenon which we have invoked for the elliptical nebulae. Kapteyn’s preferential motion may be an indication of it.

But besides this relatively rapid process, there must be a slower process of star formation, beginning with the clouds which escaped from the central region as a result of their angular momentum. These will encounter one another in a to-and-fro motion, from one side to another of the plane of the spiral.

The existence of th.ese two processes, with different ages, is perhaps the explanation of the fact that supergiant stars are not found in the elliptical nebulae or in the nucleus of spirals, but that one observes them only in the exterior region of the spirals. in fact, it is known that the stars radiate energy which comes from the transformation of their hydrogen into helium.

The supergiant stars radiate so much energy that they could only maintain this output during a hundred million years. it should be understood, thus, that, for the oldest stars, the supergiants may be extinct for lack of fuel, whereas they still shine where they have been recently formed.

What are the general consequences of my hypothesis?

It:

• takes account of the formations of stars in the nebulae.
• explains a very remarkable circumstance which could be demonstrated by the analysis of stellar spectra.

It concerns the quantitative composition of matter, or the relative abundance of the various chemical elements, which is the same in the Sun, in the stars, on the Earth and in the meteorites.

Products of the disintegration of an atom are naturally found in very definite proportions, determined by the laws of radioactive transformations.

COSMIC RAYS

The radiations produced during the disintegrations, during the first period of expansion, could explain cosmic rays.

These rays are endowed with an energy of several billion electron-volts. We know no other phenomenon currently taking place which may be capable of such effects.

That which these rays resemble most is the radiation produced during present radioactive distintegrations, but the individual energies brought into play are enormously greater.

All that agrees with rays of superradioactive origin. But it is not only by their quality that these rays are remarkable, it is also by their total quantity.

In fact, it is easy, from their observed density which is given in ergs per centimeter, to deduce their density of energy by dividinf by c, then their density in grams per cubic centimeter by dividing by c.

Thus one finds 10(34) gram per cubic centimeter, about one ten-thousandth the present density of the matter existing in the form of stars. it seems impossible to explain such an energy which represents one part in ten thousand of all existing energy, if these rays had not been produced by a process which brought into play all existing matter.

In fact, this energy, at the moment of its formation, must have been at least ten times greater, since a part of it was able to be absorbed and the remainder has been reduced as a result of the expansion of space. The total intensity observed for cosmic rays is therefore just about that which might be expected.

CONCLUSiON

The purpose of any cosmogonic theory is to seek out ideally simple conditions which could have initiated the world and from which, by the play of recognized physical forces, that world, in all its complexity, may have resulted.

I believe that my hypothesis satisfies the rules of the game.

It does not appeal to any force which is not already known. it accounts for the actual world in all its complexity.

By a single hypothesis it explains stars arranged in galaxies within an expanding universe as well as those local exceptions, the clusters of nebulae. Finally, it accounts for that mighty phenomenon, the ultrapenetrating rays.

They are truly cosmic, they testify to the primeval activity of the cosmos. in their course through wonderfully"empty space, during billions of years, they have brought us evidence of the superradioactive age, they are a sort of fossil rays which tell us what happened when the stars first appeared.

This hypothesis of the primeval atom is not yet proved.