Two concentric rings appear around the remnant of Supernova SNR 0509-67.5, indicating that it exploded twice
A “double explosion” of a star was captured for the first time. IMakes never before seen from a supernova show two concentric rings, which are the clear proof that the white dwarf star exploded twice.
One white dwarf starabout 160,000 light years away, seems to have exploded twice.
It is the first proof that astronomers have seen that such supernoves involve double detonation.
As explained, the white dwarf stars are dead stars that were already like our sun, but that sold out their nuclear fuel, leaving a nucleus the size of the earth.
If a white dwarf attracts material from a nearby star, its mass can reach a point where it rekindles and explodes as a OI TYPE SUPERNOVA.
The mechanism that leads a white dwarf becoming a supernova has not yet been well understood. Some astronomers have hypothesized that two explosions were needed, but so far there has been no proof of it.
Something never seen
Behold, a study this Wednesday in Nature Astronomy revealed something Unpublished: a dead star who exploded twice.
Astronomers studied spectra collected by the Very Large Telescope of the Southern European Observatory in Chile of a remnant of Supernova in the large cloud of Magalhães. The images of the remnant, Snr 0509-67.5, show clearly two concentric shells that exploded out.
The team theorizes that the white dwarf must have somehow collected Helium to its surface – either from another nearby white dwarf, or from a massive star rich in helium – and once accumulated enough, it exploded.
“We have a very initial detonation of helium and, tens of seconds later, we have the second detonation, so Everything happens in the blink of an eye”, He told New Scientist the leader of the investigation Priyam dasfrom the University of Nova Wales do Sul, in Camberra (Australia).
The first explosion material initially traveled to 25,000 kilometers per second, so, although the second explosion occurred only tens of seconds later, the two explosions are separated from huge distances.
The light of the explosion is thought to have reached our planet somewhere between 310 and 350 years ago.
It would have been one of the brightest objects in the night sky of the southern hemisphere, but there are no records that any human have seen him at the time – perhaps because he was hiding behind our sun.
