A telescope operated by the US National Science Foundation . captured the largest gamma- ray burst in history.
Astronomers have discovered a huge explosion in a galaxy far from Earth and believe it could be the most powerful explosion ever recorded in space . The team of scientists behind this finding has dubbed this event as “ BOAT ” ( Brightest Of All Time ), translated into Spanish as “The Brightest of All Time”.
According to what the official statement of the discovery explains, this explosion was the result of a massive burst of gamma rays that was caused by a supernova -that is, the death of a star- that gave way to a black hole. The scientific name that the team of astronomers gave to the event is GRB 221009A and it was observed through the Gemini South telescope in Chile, which is operated by NOIRLab of the US National Science Foundation
A massive explosion deep in space
Since the event was observed recently, scientists have not yet been able to carry out the corresponding exhaustive analyses, but the data found so far were the following: the explosion occurred about 2.4 billion light-years away and was recorded on the morning of 9 October by X -ray and Gamma -Ray Space Telescopes .
However, to reinforce this finding, the FLAMINGOS-2 imaging spectrograph and the Gemini multiple-object spectrograph were commissioned to collect observations independent of those of the science team to provide their own input. ” Exceptionally long GRB 221009A is the brightest [gamma-ray burst] ever recorded, and its glow is breaking all records at all wavelengths ,” said Brendan O’Connor , a researcher at the University of Maryland and George University . Washington and one of the team leaders.
In addition, the researcher added that “because this burst is so bright and also close, we believe that this is a once-in-a-century opportunity to address some of the most fundamental questions about these explosions, from the formation of black holes to evidence of dark matter models ” .
How did this gigantic outburst come about?
When a star dies, it usually lights up the universe by becoming an extremely bright supernova , which is the ejection of its mass after a gigantic implosion. Sometimes these events spawn neutron stars , which are considered to be the densest objects in space , or black holes .
When the latter forms, the star expels jets of superheated particles that move almost at the speed of light and when these point at Earth , they can be observed in X -rays and gamma rays from our planet. Although it has not yet been confirmed if it is indeed the most powerful gamma-ray burst in history, it is clear that it was at least one of the most enormous.
The speed with which astronomers were able to obtain images of the burst after detecting it demonstrates how important it is to share information between observatory teams and, of course, how important it is to always look into space to be able to make these types of discoveries.