An astronomical event intrigues scientists. One Flash LightMaybe brightest ever seen on Earth, was emitted at a distance of 2.4 billion light-years from us. Astronomers are still trying to understand the origin of luminosity, but they are betting that the gamma-ray burst was caused by the birth of a black hole.

The explosion, dubbed GRB221009A, was observed on the morning of October 9 (East Coast Time) with multiple telescopes, including NASA’s Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope, the Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory, and the Wind spacecraft. Observers with amateur telescopes could also see this event.

How and why a flash of light occurs

The hypothesis is that these flashes of light, which usually last for several minutes, are caused by the death of giant stars, more than 30 times the size of the Sun. When such a star explodes, it becomes a supernova and collapses to form a black hole. Matter at the site of the event forms a disk around the black hole and is ejected as a jet of energy moving at 99.99% the speed of light.

Scientists will continue to observe supernovae and their optical and infrared wavelengths to confirm the hypothesis of the origin of the superluminous flash. It is also assumed that supernova explosions are responsible for the production of heavy elements such as gold, platinum, uranium. Astronomers are looking for these signatures.

record brightness

The flare fired photons from 18 teraelectronic volts of power and influenced long-wave communication in the Earth’s atmosphere.

According to astrophysicist Brendan O’Connor in an interview with Agence France-Presse (AFP), the luminosity breaks records for both the number of photons and the energy of photons reaching Earth. The scientist made new observations of this phenomenon last Friday (14) using infrared instruments at the telescope of the Southern Gemini Observatory in Chile. “Something so brilliant, so close, really happens once in a century,” O’Connor said.

He explains that gamma-ray bursts typically release the same amount of energy in a matter of seconds as the Sun has produced or will produce in its entire lifetime. The power of gamma-ray bursts is so high that it can cause extinction on Earth. But O’Connor doesn’t seem worried. According to him, the energy jets are very focused and probably will not appear in our galaxy, and extinction is an unlikely scenario.

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Source: Exam

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