Two telescopes that are part of the ATLAS project in Hawaii have discover an unnaturally brilliant blowup in the sky .
The find , made in mid - June , was published inAstronomer ’s Telegram , where the objective was allot the name AT2018cow or " The Cow " for short .
Astronomers all over the earth quickly get fart of the discovery and focused their telescopes onto the area in which the aim was discovered . So far , at least 24 telescopes have try out the object more closely — and yet it ’s still not clear what the explosion was due to .
" I ’ve never seen anything like it in the local universe , " astrophysicist at Queen ’s University Belfast and director of the ATLAS projection , Stephen Smartt , tell theWashington Post .
Because of the uttermost luminance — about ten times brighter than a normal supernova — the object is thought to have originated from our galaxy but to be in the CGCG 137 - 068 galaxy , 200 million light years away .
Too bright and too libertine for a normal supernova
After further observance , astronomers find the explosion could be detected on all region of the electromagnetic spectrum , from X - rays to radio set undulation , and with unusually bright readings . The explosion was also remarkably riotous — with mellow - muscularity particles discharge outwards at around 20,000 km per second — and very hot , with a surface temperature of up to 9,000 grade Celsius .
unremarkably it takes several weeks for a supernova to reach its unattackable brightness but " The Cow " only choose a few days .
Scientists conceive it may be atype 1c supernovain which the giant star ’s nucleus collapses and it loses its outer shell of hydrogen and helium .
" We ’re not sure what it is yet , but the normal drive mechanism for a supernova is the radioactive decay of atomic number 28 — and this event was too shining and too fast , " Kate Maguire , an uranologist from Queen ’s University Belfast , told New Scientist .
Astronomers will be carrying out further measuring and analyses to find out precisely what the explosion was .
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