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NASA Detects Nearby Mystery Explosion

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the kaboooooom dept.

starexplorer2001 writes "Space.com is reporting that NASA has detected a 'totally new' mystery explosion near our galaxy." From the article: "The event, detected Feb. 18, looks something like a gamma-ray burst (GRB), scientists said. But it is much closer--about 440 million light-years away--than others. And it lasted about 33 minutes. Most GRBs are billions of light-years away and last less than a second or just a few seconds."

30 of 329 comments (clear)

  1. Is this some new meaning of the word 'nearby'? by sbaker · · Score: 4, Funny

    2,586,000,000,000,000,000,000 miles away is 'nearby' ?!

    --
    www.sjbaker.org
    1. Re:Is this some new meaning of the word 'nearby'? by 2.7182 · · Score: 2, Interesting

      That's a lot closer that 10 billion light years away, which is about the age of the universe, depending on which NYT Science Times article you believe.

      Think of it this way - life appeared about a billion years ago, so that was twice as long ago as when this event happened. We're seeing an event that happenned a little before the dinosaurs appeared.

    2. Re:Is this some new meaning of the word 'nearby'? by maxwell+demon · · Score: 3, Insightful

      It's just about 4400 times the diameter of our galaxy. So imagine the milky way were your house. Of course I don't know the diameter of your house, but let's just assume it's something like 10 meters. Then in relation it would be 44 km away. Ok, I admit, that's not really "nearby" any more ... but then, thinking of it, the center of gravitation of a geek is his computer, so make that about half a meter, so the distance shrinks to 2.2 km ... would you accept that as nearby, or do I have to mention that the really important part of the computer is the CPU anyway? :-)

      --
      The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
    3. Re:Is this some new meaning of the word 'nearby'? by Andrzej+Sawicki · · Score: 2, Funny

      Ver, very metaphorical indeed.

    4. Re:Is this some new meaning of the word 'nearby'? by meringuoid · · Score: 2, Informative
      Think of it this way - life appeared about a billion years ago, so that was twice as long ago as when this event happened. We're seeing an event that happenned a little before the dinosaurs appeared.

      I think you're a bit off. Life appeared very soon after the Earth formed - a bit over four billion years ago. IIRC, multicellular life got going at about a billion years ago, and vertebrates invaded the land about half a billion years ago.

      Of course if you happen to live in Kansas then YMMV.

      --
      Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
    5. Re:Is this some new meaning of the word 'nearby'? by advocate_one · · Score: 2, Informative
      2,586,000,000,000,000,000,000 miles away is 'nearby' ?!

      Yes... cosmologically speaking... it's only just outside the local supercluster... it's on this map... you can't miss it... just remember to take a left at Alburquerque

      --
      Donald 'Duck' Dunn: We had a band powerful enough to turn goat piss into gasoline.
  2. pardon me by coaxeus · · Score: 4, Funny

    sorry, that was me, I had tacobell for lunch.

    --
    My name is coaxeus, and I approve this message. In fact, I think it is awesome.
  3. Two words by Billosaur · · Score: 3, Funny

    Death Star

    --
    GetOuttaMySpace - The Anti-Social Network
    1. Re:Two words by HTH+NE1 · · Score: 2, Informative

      I thought I'd felt a great disturbance in the Force.

      --
      Oh, say does that Star-Spangled Banner entwine / The myrtle of Venus with Bacchus's vine?
  4. And we're sure... by BadanTheUgly · · Score: 4, Funny

    ...it wasn't Dick Cheney?

  5. Genisis? by LordPhantom · · Score: 3, Funny

    Am I the only one thinking "KAAAAHHHHNNNNNN!!!!!!"?

    1. Re:Genisis? by Dausha · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Yes, you are. :-) After all, that is set in the future.

      I actually thought that the explosion of the Death Star, which occurred "A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away" would have just about reached us by now. Watch for a second similar "mystery" explosion in about ten years.

      --
      What those who want activist courts fear is rule by the people.
  6. Alt-F4 by chigun · · Score: 2, Funny

    Has anyone heard anything about the Four brave cosmonauts that were up there studying this?

    --
    swanker than you
    1. Re:Alt-F4 by dr_dank · · Score: 3, Funny

      Has anyone heard anything about the Four brave cosmonauts that were up there studying this?

      Early reports mention that one is now invisible, another turned to stone, one can now stretch, and the cocky one can set himself on fire.

      --
      Where does the school board find them and why do they keep sending them to ME?
  7. Re:aliens? by AKAImBatman · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I'm going for "how little we understand the universe". All our theories are nice and tidy, but none of them really predict the organized chaos of the universe. They only describe what is possible, probably, or unlikely. Thus every once in a while we come across something that we didn't expect, or (even better) we come across something our current theories can't explain. (Which then results in a greater understanding of the universe, and an update to our theories.) :-)

    --
    Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
  8. OMG! by telchine · · Score: 4, Funny

    OMG! They're making room for a hyperpace-bypass!

  9. Slashdot gets scooped again! by KrancHammer · · Score: 3, Funny

    Pffft! We gonglorians at digg.magellanclouds.com.et had this story posted 440 million years ago!

    --
    Trolls: The high-tech version of those morons that scrawl obscenities in public bathrooms.
  10. Re:I'm confused by ChowRiit · · Score: 5, Informative

    That's right: nothing can travel faster than the speed of light, not even information. We are witnessing something that happened millions of years ago, but because the electromagnetic waves (light, gamma rays etc) carrying the information are all travelling at the same speed (the speed of light), we get a chronological "look" at how the event panned out millions of years ago.

    In actual fact, when you look at, say, a chair, you're actually seeing the chair as it was several (nano/pico/something, not sure of the exact time interval) seconds ago (a very small time period).

  11. Intersting... by ChowRiit · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Ignoring all the silly posts above, this is a fascinating event. It's nice to know there's still mystery in the universe, and the prospect of seeing a supernova unfold is very exciting. I'm not sure, but I believe a supernova would outshine any other stars in the sky, even from that distance (although this may only be stars within out galaxy). Either way, it will let us get valuable information on the hardest part of a star's life to observe: their death.

  12. Re:I'm confused by TheWanderingHermit · · Score: 2, Interesting

    That's right: nothing can travel faster than the speed of light, not even information.

    Quantam entanglement can.

  13. For the technical details, see ... by StupendousMan · · Score: 5, Informative

    IAU Circular 8674, which states in part

    [a spectrum] obtained with Gemini-South telescope (+ GMOS) on Feb. 21.024 UT, shows that underlying a power-law continuum are features consistent with a broad-lined type-Ib/c supernova (designated 2006aj) near maximum light, confirming the findings of Masetti et al. (GCN 4803).

    There is a good deal of news in the GRBLog:

    http://grad40.as.utexas.edu/grblog.php

    Just search for "GRB 060218".

    It appears to be a Type Ib/c supernova -- meaning a massive star, which has lost most of its hydrogen envelope, running out of fuel in its core and exploding -- in a relatively nearby galaxy. By "nearby", I mean "at a redshift of z=0.033", which is still much farther away than the Virgo or Coma clusters of galaxies.

    It is currently around magnitude 18, and may brighten by a magnitude or so, but will still require a pretty big telescope and sensitive camera to detect.

    --
    Michael Richmond "This is the heart that broke my finger."
    mwrsps@rit.edu http://stupendous.rit.edu
    1. Re:For the technical details, see ... by graemecoates · · Score: 5, Informative
      The parent post seems pretty quite knowledgeable... anyone wanna translate it into dumb-ass for the rest of us?

      I'll have a go...

      [a spectrum] obtained with Gemini-South telescope (+ GMOS) on Feb. 21.024 UT, shows that underlying a power-law continuum are features consistent with a broad-lined type-Ib/c supernova (designated 2006aj) near maximum light, confirming the findings of Masetti et al. (GCN 4803).

      A very big telescope in Chile (GMOS) took an image of the object and recorded it's spectrum (light broken down by wavelength and recorded). From the spectrum, there is continuum radiation than has intensity proportional to the wavelength raised to some power. However, there are also features (spectral lines) in the spectrum which suggest it is a Type Ib or Ic supernova (exploding star).

      It appears to be a Type Ib/c supernova -- meaning a massive star, which has lost most of its hydrogen envelope, running out of fuel in its core and exploding -- in a relatively nearby galaxy. By "nearby", I mean "at a redshift of z=0.033", which is still much farther away than the Virgo or Coma clusters of galaxies.

      Supernovae like these occur due to the collapse of the core of a star as there is not enough fuel to sustain fusion to keep the star from collapsing under it's own gravity. The implosion creates a massive amount of heat which causes the explosion we see. Different to the proposed mechanism for a Ia Supernova.

      It's actually pretty close (in universe terms). (Still a damn long way away!) The redshift (z) is defined at wikipedia. The Virgo and Coma clusters are large nearby galaxy clusters.

      It is currently around magnitude 18, and may brighten by a magnitude or so, but will still require a pretty big telescope and sensitive camera to detect.

      Each decrease in magnitude is 100^1/5 times brighter than the previous one (it's a little confusing). A magnitude 0 star is about 2.5 times brighter than a magnitude 1 which is 2.5times brighter than magnitude 2, and so on. The brightest star in the sky (Sirius - visible tonight) is magnitude -1.6 (negatives are fine). The dimmest star you'll see with unaided eyesight is about 6 in really good dark skies, about 2 or 3 from a city. The Sun is -26.7, the moon about -13. This object is about 60000 times dimmer than a magnitude 6 star. (100^(12/5)).

      Amateur telescopes with ccd cameras should be able to record this. It'd be pretty much impossible to actually see with the human eye and a telescope.

      In brief, a star went bang; it's the first time we've been able to see it this early in the explosion; it's fairly close (but not too close); Don't bother to try to look for it in binoculars.

  14. Re:I'm confused by roman_mir · · Score: 2, Funny

    nothing can travel faster than the speed of light - oh, I wouldn't be so sure about that. Human stupidity can travel much faster than light.

    --
    You can't handle the truth.
  15. What's wrong? by Dark+Paladin · · Score: 2, Funny

    Obi-Wan: It's as if a million voices all cried out in terror - and were suddenly silenced.

    Luke: I knew I shouldn't have had the extra beans on that jawa burrito.

    --
    52 Weeks, 52 Religions with John Hummel
  16. Re:Do not attempt this at home by HTH+NE1 · · Score: 3, Funny

    Supernova explosion with 33-minute GRB display and loud report. Light and get away.

    --
    Oh, say does that Star-Spangled Banner entwine / The myrtle of Venus with Bacchus's vine?
  17. Re:I'm confused by Weird+O'Puns · · Score: 2, Interesting
    nothing can travel faster than the speed of light

    <nitpick>

    Single particles can. For real life example see Cherekov radiation.

    </nitpick>

  18. SETI picked up the following radio transmission... by Zerbey · · Score: 4, Funny

    Just prior the explosion was heard:

    "Hey, Billy-Joe! Watch THIS!"

  19. Universe by SchrodingersRoot · · Score: 4, Informative

    According to the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP), which, IIRC, is the most recent measuring of the Hubble Constant, the value for the Hubble Constant is 71 ± 4 km/s/Mpc. This would give the universe an age of 13.7 ± 0.2 billion years.

    Other findings of WMAP include the makeup of the universe as 4% matter, 23% dark matter, and 73% dark energy, and a flat geometry for the universe.

    Best estimates for the age of our solar system are currently about 4.6 billion years. Life ostensibly started very quickly, on a cosmological timeline. IIRC, earliest evidence of life points to around 3.5 billion years ago.

    But your point about it being a lot more recent on a cosmological scale are correct.

  20. Re:I'm confused by aluminum_geek · · Score: 2, Interesting



    Technically you are correct. However, what most people mean is nothing can travel faster than the speed of light in a vaccuum. Cherekov radiation is just an example of a particle traveling faster than the speed of light in air. While difficult, this is (obviously) not impossible. The speed of light varies depending on the medium it's traveling in, just like sound.
    Now, if you accept the quantum mechanics view of the universe, theoretically some things can go faster than the speed of light, eg hawking radiation.

    </Supernitpicking>

  21. Re:I'm confused by roystgnr · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I believe the light travels about 12 inches in a nanosecond.

    Google agrees.

    It makes you realize just how fast multi-Gigahertz processors are, doesn't it? Look over at your computer - by the time the light from it reaches your eyes, it's probably already working on it's next instruction.