Latest news with #EuropeanSouthernObservatory
GMA Network
2 hours ago
- Science
- GMA Network
Astronomers get picture of aftermath of a star's double detonation
The supernova remnant SNR 0509-67.5 view from the European Southern Observatory's Very Large Telescope, the expanding remains of a star that exploded hundreds of years ago in a double-detonation – the first photographic evidence that stars can die with two blasts, as seen in this undated handout picture obtained by Reuters on July 2, 2025. WASHINGTON —The explosion of a star, called a supernova, is an immensely violent event. It usually involves a star more than eight times the mass of our sun that exhausts its nuclear fuel and undergoes a core collapse, triggering a single powerful explosion. But a rarer kind of supernova involves a different type of star - a stellar ember called a white dwarf - and a double detonation. Researchers have obtained photographic evidence of this type of supernova for the first time, using the European Southern Observatory's Chile-based Very Large Telescope. The back-to-back explosions obliterated a white dwarf that had a mass roughly equal to the sun and was located about 160,000 light?years from Earth in the direction of the constellation Dorado in a galaxy near the Milky Way called the Large Magellanic Cloud. A light-year is the distance light travels in a year, 5.9 trillion miles (9.5 trillion km). The image shows the scene of the explosion roughly 300 years after it occurred, with two concentric shells of the element calcium moving outward. This type of explosion, called a Type Ia supernova, would have involved the interaction between a white dwarf and a closely orbiting companion star - either another white dwarf or an unusual star rich in helium - in what is called a binary system. The primary white dwarf through its gravitational pull would begin to siphon helium from its companion. The helium on the white dwarf's surface at some point would become so hot and dense that it would detonate, producing a shockwave that would compress and ignite the star's underlying core and trigger a second detonation. "Nothing remains. The white dwarf is completely disrupted," said Priyam Das, a doctoral student in astrophysics at the University of New South Wales Canberra in Australia, lead author of the study published on Wednesday in the journal Nature Astronomy. "The time delay between the two detonations is essentially set by the time it takes the helium detonation to travel from one pole of the star all the way around to the other. It's only about two seconds," said astrophysicist and study co-author Ivo Seitenzahl, a visiting scientist at the Australian National University in Canberra. In the more common type of supernova, a remnant of the massive exploded star is left behind in the form of a dense neutron star or a black hole. The researchers used the Very Large Telescope's Multi-Unit Spectroscopic Explorer, or MUSE, instrument to map the distribution of different chemical elements in the supernova aftermath. Calcium is seen in blue in the image - an outer ring caused by the first detonation and an inner ring by the second. These two calcium shells represent "the perfect smoking-gun evidence of the double-detonation mechanism," Das said. "We can call this forensic astronomy - my made-up term - since we are studying the dead remains of stars to understand what caused the death," Das said. Stars with up to eight times the mass of our sun appear destined to become a white dwarf. They eventually burn up all the hydrogen they use as fuel. Gravity then causes them to collapse and blow off their outer layers in a "red giant" stage, eventually leaving behind a compact core - the white dwarf. The vast majority of these do not explode as supernovas. While scientists knew of the existence of Type Ia supernovas, there had been no clear visual evidence of such a double detonation until now. Type Ia supernovas are important in terms of celestial chemistry in that they forge heavier elements such as calcium, sulfur and iron. "This is essential for understanding galactic chemical evolution including the building blocks of planets and life," Das said. A shell of sulfur also was seen in the new observations of the supernova aftermath. Iron is a crucial part of Earth's planetary composition and, of course, a component of human red blood cells. In addition to its scientific importance, the image offers aesthetic value. "It's beautiful," Seitenzahl said. "We are seeing the birth process of elements in the death of a star. The Big Bang only made hydrogen and helium and lithium. Here we see how calcium, sulfur or iron are made and dispersed back into the host galaxy, a cosmic cycle of matter."—Reuters
CNA
5 hours ago
- Science
- CNA
Astronomers get picture of aftermath of a star's double detonation
WASHINGTON :The explosion of a star, called a supernova, is an immensely violent event. It usually involves a star more than eight times the mass of our sun that exhausts its nuclear fuel and undergoes a core collapse, triggering a single powerful explosion. But a rarer kind of supernova involves a different type of star - a stellar ember called a white dwarf - and a double detonation. Researchers have obtained photographic evidence of this type of supernova for the first time, using the European Southern Observatory's Chile-based Very Large Telescope. The back-to-back explosions obliterated a white dwarf that had a mass roughly equal to the sun and was located about 160,000 light‑years from Earth in the direction of the constellation Dorado in a galaxy near the Milky Way called the Large Magellanic Cloud. A light-year is the distance light travels in a year, 5.9 trillion miles (9.5 trillion km). The image shows the scene of the explosion roughly 300 years after it occurred, with two concentric shells of the element calcium moving outward. This type of explosion, called a Type Ia supernova, would have involved the interaction between a white dwarf and a closely orbiting companion star - either another white dwarf or an unusual star rich in helium - in what is called a binary system. The primary white dwarf through its gravitational pull would begin to siphon helium from its companion. The helium on the white dwarf's surface at some point would become so hot and dense that it would detonate, producing a shockwave that would compress and ignite the star's underlying core and trigger a second detonation. "Nothing remains. The white dwarf is completely disrupted," said Priyam Das, a doctoral student in astrophysics at the University of New South Wales Canberra in Australia, lead author of the study published on Wednesday in the journal Nature Astronomy. "The time delay between the two detonations is essentially set by the time it takes the helium detonation to travel from one pole of the star all the way around to the other. It's only about two seconds," said astrophysicist and study co-author Ivo Seitenzahl, a visiting scientist at the Australian National University in Canberra. In the more common type of supernova, a remnant of the massive exploded star is left behind in the form of a dense neutron star or a black hole. The researchers used the Very Large Telescope's Multi-Unit Spectroscopic Explorer, or MUSE, instrument to map the distribution of different chemical elements in the supernova aftermath. Calcium is seen in blue in the image - an outer ring caused by the first detonation and an inner ring by the second. These two calcium shells represent "the perfect smoking-gun evidence of the double-detonation mechanism," Das said. "We can call this forensic astronomy - my made-up term - since we are studying the dead remains of stars to understand what caused the death," Das said. Stars with up to eight times the mass of our sun appear destined to become a white dwarf. They eventually burn up all the hydrogen they use as fuel. Gravity then causes them to collapse and blow off their outer layers in a "red giant" stage, eventually leaving behind a compact core - the white dwarf. The vast majority of these do not explode as supernovas. While scientists knew of the existence of Type Ia supernovas, there had been no clear visual evidence of such a double detonation until now. Type Ia supernovas are important in terms of celestial chemistry in that they forge heavier elements such as calcium, sulfur and iron. "This is essential for understanding galactic chemical evolution including the building blocks of planets and life," Das said. A shell of sulfur also was seen in the new observations of the supernova aftermath. Iron is a crucial part of Earth's planetary composition and, of course, a component of human red blood cells. In addition to its scientific importance, the image offers aesthetic value. "It's beautiful," Seitenzahl said. "We are seeing the birth process of elements in the death of a star. The Big Bang only made hydrogen and helium and lithium. Here we see how calcium, sulfur or iron are made and dispersed back into the host galaxy, a cosmic cycle of matter."
Yahoo
15 hours ago
- Science
- Yahoo
ALMA lets astronomers see building blocks of early galaxies
Chile's ALMA observatory, which houses some of the world's most powerful telescopes, has captured its most detailed images to date of the building blocks of the early universe -- primarily cold gases, dust and stellar light in 39 galaxies. "We've never achieved so much detail and depth in galaxies from the early universe," Sergio Martin, head of Scientific Operations at ALMA, told AFP during a presentation of the research at University of Concepcion in Santiago. Due to its dark skies and clear air, Chile hosts the telescopes of more than 30 countries, including the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) that was used in the findings. The research was led by Rodrigo Herrera-Camus, director of the Millennium Nucleus of Galaxies (MINGAL) of Chile, who told AFP the new images provide "the opportunity to study how stars are born." The survey also found that stars emerged in "giant clumps," Herrera-Camus said. By combining ALMA's findings with images from the James Webb and Hubble telescopes, researchers were able to learn more about how galaxies evolve, interact, and form stars. The ALMA telescope was developed by the European Southern Observatory, the US National Radio Astronomy Observatory and the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan. axl/ksb/sla/jgc
Gizmodo
15 hours ago
- Science
- Gizmodo
Star Meets Stunning End by Exploding Twice
Astronomers have, for the first time, witnessed a star meeting a dramatic end by exploding twice. In a study published in Nature Astronomy, researchers analyzed the centuries-old remains of supernova SNR 0509-67.5 with the European Southern Observatory's Very Large Telescope, finding the first visual evidence of a star's 'double-detonation.' Most supernovae are the explosive result of massive stars collapsing when they exhaust their nuclear fuel. Others, though, come from white dwarfs, the inactive cores left over after smaller stars like our Sun run out of fuel. 'The explosions of white dwarfs play a crucial role in astronomy,' Priyam Das, a PhD student at the University of New South Wales Canberra, Australia, and a study co-author, said in a statement. 'Yet, despite their importance, the long-standing puzzle of the exact mechanism triggering their explosion remains unsolved.' When they share a star system with another star, white dwarfs can produce what astronomers call a Type Ia supernova. These supernovae occur only in binary star systems, when a white dwarf, like a selfish sibling, steals material from its companion star until it grows to a critical mass. At this point, the white dwarf becomes unstable, resulting in a massive explosion. Recent studies have hinted that this might not be the whole story. Astronomers have theorized that at least some Type Ia supernovae could actually be the result of not one but two explosions. In this scenario, the white dwarf blankets itself in helium-rich material stolen from its partner star. That helium becomes unstable and detonates, sending a shockwave through the inactive star. This triggers yet another blast starting in the star's core, ultimately creating a supernova. Astronomers predicted that a double detonation would leave a unique fingerprint in a supernova's remains, visible long after the initial explosion. Until now, astronomers didn't have any visual evidence of this fingerprint. But they were finally able to find some in studying supernova SNR 0509-67.5, by observing it with the Multi Unit Spectroscopic Explorer (MUSE) on the European Southern Observatory's Very Large Telescope. The analysis allowed the researchers to determine the distribution of different chemical elements, displayed in the image as different colors. They clearly saw distinct layers of calcium, arranged in two concentric shells. These two layers provide evidence that the star experienced two blasts. The results were 'a clear indication that white dwarfs can explode well before they reach the famous Chandrasekhar mass limit, and that the 'double-detonation' mechanism does indeed occur in nature,' Ivo Seitenzahl, a researcher at the Heidelberg Institute for Theoretical Studies in Germany, said in a statement. Besides being extremely cool, Type Ia supernovae are also key to studying the universe's expansion and dark energy, as their consistent behavior and predictable brightness can help astronomers measure distances in space. And, as a bonus, it's visually stunning. 'This tangible evidence of a double-detonation not only contributes towards solving a long-standing mystery, but also offers a visual spectacle,' Das said in a statement, describing the 'beautifully layered structure' that a supernova creates.
Malay Mail
6 days ago
- Science
- Malay Mail
Snow blankets Atacama Desert, the world's driest, in rare weather event
SANTIAGO, June 27 — Residents of the world's driest desert, the Atacama in northern Chile, woke up Thursday to a jaw-dropping spectacle: its famous lunar landscape blanketed in snow. "INCREDIBLE! The Atacama Desert, the world's most arid, is COVERED IN SNOW," the ALMA observatory, situated 2,900 meters (9,500 feet) above sea level, wrote on X, alongside a video of vast expanses covered in a dusting of white. The observatory added that while snow is common on the nearby Chajnanator Plateau, situated at over 5,000 meters and where its gigantic telescope is situated, it had not had snow at its main facility in a decade. University of Santiago climatologist Raul Cordero told AFP that it was too soon to link the snow to climate change but said that climate modelling had shown that "this type of event, meaning precipitation in the Atacama desert, will likely become more frequent." The Atacama, home to the world's darkest skies, has for decades been the go-to location for the world's most advanced telescopes. The ALMA telescope, which was developed by the European Southern Observatory, the US National Radio Astronomy Observatory and the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan, is widely recognized as being the most powerful. — AFP
