'Sky Eye' helps unlock mysteries of the universe

Using the Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical Radio Telescope (FAST), or the "China Sky Eye", Chinese and international astronomers observed a complex filamentary structure network dominated by supersonic turbulence within an interstellar gas cloud moving at ultrahigh speed in the Milky Way.

Such results have provided new insights into revealing the material sources and evolutionary pathways of the interstellar clouds, where new stars and planets form and secrets related to the birth of the solar system may hide, said the Shanghai Astronomical Observatory of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

A paper about the research was published on the website of the journal Nature Astronomy on Wednesday.