When a red superstar is only a few months away from the explosion, this system will remind astronomers.
artist's impression of Betelgeuse supernova.
Scientists have discovered a clue that a star is about to become an supernova . This new discovery could help astronomers discover in advance using a "early warning system" before one of the cosmic explosions, allowing scientists to observe in real time.
"With this early warning system, we can be prepared to observe them in real time, pointing the world's best telescopes toward precursor stars. With this early warning, scientists can watch them be torn apart in front of our eyes," said Benjamin Davis, the study's lead author.
research was published in the "Royal Astronomical Society Monthly Notice" on October 13, simulating the data on how a red superstar looked like a year before becoming a supernova. Such stars expand in size and can self-destruct in II-P supernovae, or violently explode in stars between 8 to 40 to 50 sun mass . Simulations show that a ring-shaped dust cocoon will form around the star before the explosion occurs.
"Recent studies of supernovae have shown that the explosion of stars are nested in a thick cocoon of matter, probably ejected from the stars before it died, and we don't know why stars do this -- it was expected, and there was no adverse effect on images of stars taken about a year ago when they died." Davis, an astrophysicist at John Moore University in Liverpool, UK, said.
The paper determines that stars between 8 and 20 times the mass of the sun, and in the last red superstar phase, undergo dramatic changes in their last months.
These stars suddenly became about 100 times weaker in visible light in the last few months before their death. This darkening may be caused by a sudden accumulation of matter around the star, which masks the star's light, although scientists are not sure how this happens.
Davis said: "Our best option is the late trigger gravity/pressure wave of for the nuclear combustion ." Scientists have previously inferred that this happened to the most extreme supernova. "But we don't know until we can see it happen."
So far, astronomers have not had the opportunity to watch supernova explosion in real time. The most recent observation so far is SN 2013fs, a supernova that exploded in the spiral galaxy NGC 7610, about 160 million light-years away from the Earth in Pegasus . It was observed in October 2013, just three hours after its light reached Earth.
Davis said: "When you see a supernova so early, you'll see the outer edge of the 'coon' illuminated from the inside by a violent explosion." "By constantly monitoring it, [astronomers] can determine when the supernova transcends the cocoon, thus determining how far it is from the star."
Because dense matter almost completely obscures the stars before the explosion, astronomers who want to capture supernova in real time will need telescopes to remind them of a star that is about 100 times darker in the visible part of the spectrum. The upcoming Villa Rubin Observatory (VRO) will be available in 2023, which will be possible, with its 3.2-gigapixel camera-powered all-sky survey will look for small changes in the entire visible sky every three nights. "VRO will be able to see about half of the red superstars in about 10 million light years, allowing us to monitor them every few days or so," Davis said. "If we see a person suddenly starts to darken sharply, this may indicate that the countdown for the supernova has begun." With this information, astronomers will be able to point other telescopes to the target to study the physical conditions of the stars being ejected and deformed into the atmosphere around them.
The closest red superstar to the solar system is the betel nut of Orion , which in February 2020 was observed that it had lost 2-3 of its normal brightness after a large amount of ejection from its surface. However, this darkening is not the result of the upcoming supernova.
Davis said: "A red superstar with a 'supernova countdown' is like betel nut on steroids." "It will get blurry, faster, and may disappear completely from the field of view of the visual wavelength in a few weeks."
Other red superstars in the night sky include Antares, about 555 light-years away from Scorpio and Aldebaran, about 65 light-years away from Taurus .
