Brightest Cosmic Explosion Ever Witnessed Puzzles Scientists
Astronomers in April, 2013 saw the biggest and brightest cosmic explosion ever witnessed, a large gamma-ray burst.
Sign up for Big Think on Substack
The most surprising and impactful new stories delivered to your inbox every week, for free.
This image is an artist’s rendering of a gamma-ray burst caused by a massive star exhausting its nuclear fuel, exploding and collapsing to form a black hole.
This event is known as GRB 130427A, the biggest and brightest cosmic explosion ever witnessed, which astronomers saw in April, 2013. The exploding star from 3.8 billion light-years away has caused scientists to question what we know about gamma-ray bursts.
“Some of our theories are just going down the drain,” said Charles Dermer, an astrophysicist at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico.
Read more here.
Image courtesy of NASA Goddard Space Flight Center
Sign up for Big Think on Substack
The most surprising and impactful new stories delivered to your inbox every week, for free.
