SN2016aps: Scientists Have Identified the Biggest and Brightest Known Supernova

0
268

SN2016aps: Scientists Have Identified the Biggest and Brightest Known Supernova

A supernova is a stellar explosion that occurs when the star reaches the end of its life cycle. Supernovae can outshine entire galaxies for a brief period of time and produce more energy than the Sun will in its entire lifetime.

An international team of astronomers led by the University of Birmingham has identified the biggest and the brightest known supernova. The SN2016aps was discovered four years ago by the Panoramic Survey Telescope and Rapid Response System in Hawaii. Researchers have analyzed it for years. They published the results of their study in the journal Nature Astronomy.

SN2016aps is twice as bright and has twice as much energy as a typical supernova. According to researchers, it was so bright that at the beginning scientists couldn’t even see the galaxy where it was located until the supernova’s light had faded.

Besides the unprecedented levels of radiation, the mass of the SN2016aps is enormous. Usually supernovae have 8 to 15 solar masses (a mass bigger than the mass of the Sun). SN2016aps’s mass is between 50 to 100 solar masses.

Scientists suspect that it could be a “pulsation pair-stability” supernova, a scientific hypothesis that has not been yet verified.

Researchers say that the SN2016aps could be the result of two stars merging together before the explosion. Scientists note that with the help of NASA’s James Webb Space telescope they will be able to study similar events so far away “that we can look back in time to the deaths of the very first stars in the Universe”.

Sourse: sputniknews.com

SN2016aps: Scientists Have Identified the Biggest and Brightest Known Supernova

0.00 (0%) 0 votes