2024-01-11 13:39:59
New Evidence of Neutron Stars and Black Holes Formed from Supernova Explosions
Black holes and neutron stars are the densest known celestial objects in the universe. While scientists have had many clues about the formation of supernovae into these dense objects, there has been a lack of direct observational evidence. However, astronomers have recently obtained direct evidence that massive stars undergo supernova explosions and form black holes and neutron stars.
When a massive star reaches the end of its life, it will rapidly collapse under its own gravity, triggering a violent explosion called a supernova. Astronomers believe that after a massive star undergoes this explosion, it will leave behind an ultra-dense core or compact remnant, which may be a neutron star or a black hole.
In May 2022, South African amateur astronomer Berto Monard discovered supernova SN 2022jli in the spiral arm of the nearby galaxy NGC 157, 75 million light-years away, attracting the attention of two different teams from the Weizmann Institute of Science and Queen’s University Belfast. The teams used the Very Large Telescope (VLT) and the New Technology Telescope (NTT) to observe the aftermath of the supernova explosion, and for the first time, directly found evidence of the dense objects it left behind.
The observed brightness decline of SN 2022jli was not smooth but oscillated up and down every 12 days or so, which led the researchers to believe that the presence of more than one star in the system where SN 2022jli appeared can explain this behavior. The teams concluded that the companion star was rich in hydrogen when it interacted with material thrown off during the supernova explosion, causing the atmosphere to become fluffier than usual.
As the researchers gathered more data, they discovered periodic movements of the system’s hydrogen gas and gamma ray bursts, leading to the conclusion that the dense objects left behind by the explosion would steal hydrogen gas as they quickly passed through the companion star’s atmosphere in orbit, forming a hot material disk around themselves. This periodic material stealing behavior releases a large amount of energy, causing regular changes in the observed brightness.
Although the research team cannot currently observe light from the compact object itself, the energy accretion behavior can only come from an invisible neutron star or black hole. The two papers detailing these findings were published in the journals “Nature” and “The Astrophysical Journal Letters,” respectively.
If new research in the future confirms the existence of black holes or neutron stars in this system, it will be possible to further unravel the exact nature of compact objects and the outcome of this system. This discovery marks a significant step forward in our understanding of the formation of these incredibly dense celestial bodies.
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