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Supernova Birth Observed From Orbiting Telescope
FiReaNGeL writes "Astronomers have seen the aftermath of spectacular stellar explosions known as supernovae before, but no one had witnessed a star dying in real time — until now. While looking at another object in the spiral galaxy NGC 2770, using NASA's orbiting Swift telescope, scientists detected an extremely luminous blast of X-rays released by a supernova explosion. They alerted 8 other telescopes to turn their eyes on this first-of-its-kind event. 'We were looking at another, older supernova in the galaxy, when the one now known as SN 2008D went off. We would have missed it if it weren't for Swift's real-time capabilities, wide field of view, and numerous instruments.'" Bad Astronomy has an excellent, well-illustrated story about the discovery as well. I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property contributes a link to the BBC's coverage, and adds a nugget gleaned from Ars Technica: "SN 2007uy's collapse caused an X-ray burst of about 10^39 joules, most likely due to the 'shock break out' when the energy of the core's collapse finally reached the neutron star's surface."
Now, Who put metal in the microwave?
Does anyone else taste blue?
Yes, it happened ~100 million years ago and from our point of view we just watched it in real time.
And the sun in the sky is 8 minutes old.
And your conscious mind is 1/2 second behind.
And I'd really rather you not remind me of disturbing things like this and leave me in peace with my bottle of Cragganmore. Now go away.
I felt a great disturbance in the Force, as if millions of voices suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced. I thought it was the beans I had eaten the night before.
All things are relative and all my relatives are things ......
Undetectable Steganography? Yep, there's an app fo
The dangers of firing up the Large Hadron Collider. Repent now, ye scientists, before we create a black hole! Or cause the sun to go nova! Or cause a Spice Girls Reunion Tour!
I see photons hitting my retina in real time.
Yeah that's right, another dupe from slashdot; this story was covered 97 million years ago when it actually happened.
Supernovas all look the same at birth but it's proper form to smile politely and congratulate the parents anyway.