ScienceSpace & Spaceflight

The Ghost of a Long-Dead Star Still Haunts Our Solar System

A few million years ago, humans’ ancestors might have gazed in wonder at a strange, brilliant blue spot in the night sky. It was the aftermath of an epic stellar explosion, maybe two. Had these supernovae occurred a little closer to home, life on Earth would have been toast. Obviously, things didn’t go down that … Continued

ScienceSpace & Spaceflight

A Cosmic Explosion Left Radioactive Fallout at the Bottom of the Ocean

Several million years ago, a series of nearby supernovae explosions lit up the sky, rained radioactive particles down on our planet, and might have kickstarted a major climactic shift. That’s according to a pair of studies published today in Nature, which link radioactive debris spread across the seafloor to cosmic fireworks hundreds of light years … Continued

ScienceSpace & Spaceflight

First Ever Supernova ‘Shock Breakout’ Captured in Visible Light

When a star dies and erupts as a supernova it can produce a short, sharp shockwave that astronomers call a “shock breakout.” For the first time ever, astronomers have captured such an event as optical light. When a red supergiant star runs out of fuel and can no longer sustain itself, gravity causes its core … Continued

Tech News

Kepler May Be the Most Productive Broken Telescope Ever

The Kepler spacecraft came roaring back into the news last week, when scientists announced that the plucky little planet hunter had unearthed hundreds of new exoplanets in our cosmic backyard, despite being literally broken. But that’s not all Kepler’s been up to—by a long shot. The Kepler space telescope was humanity’s premier planet-seeking instrument from … Continued

io9

Astronomers Spot a Record-Breaking Supernova

An exceptionally bright supernova discovered last month appears to shine brighter than 500 billion Suns. That’s twice as luminous as the previous record—but because it’s low in hydrogen, scientists are confused as to where this exploding star got all its energy. Above: The remnant of star SNR E0519-69.0, a different supernova than the one recently … Continued

ScienceSpace & Spaceflight

Three Stars Were Exiled From their Galaxies to Explode in a Cosmic Void

It’s easy to imagine the universe as an endless sea of stars, but that’s a biased, Earthly perspective. If we could zoom very far out, we’d see bright cosmic clusters like our Milky Way, and between them, unimaginably vast stretches of empty intergalactic space. Artist’s concept of a Type Ia supernova exploding in the region … Continued

io9

Our first glimpse of the dusty remnants of an exploding star

See that reddish cloud inside this supernova’s shockwave? It’s a massive plume of dust that formed shortly after the star ripped itself to shreds. The observation was made using the the brand new ALMA telescope — and it’s one that will help explain how galaxies got their dusty and dim complexion. The image above is … Continued

io9

Behold, the most distant supernova explosion ever photographed

You’re looking at one of the most far-flung star explosions ever recorded. Dubbed Supernova UDS10Wil (aka “SN Wilson,” after Woodrow Wilson), it detonated more than 10 billion years ago, but only recently has its light found its way to NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope. SN Wilson is what’s called a Type Ia supernova, a genus of … Continued

io9

The diamonds that are born in supernovae

Black diamonds, also known as carbonados, are dark, porous, and found only in Brazil and Central Africa. And they don’t come from volcanoes — they come from outer space. Carbonados don’t look like much when they’re first yanked out of the ground, but that doesn’t differentiate them much from other diamonds. They’re as hard as … Continued