Luminous Supernovas: The Most Powerful Explosions in Space

The Brightest SuperNova ever seen. This is an artist’s illustrations of a brilliant supernova. Aaron Geller/Northwestern University.

A Slight Detour

A new ozone hole is opening and spreading over the North Pole. Image European Space Agency

Scientists believe this to be the largest hole in the ozone layer ever recorded.

The hole covers an area roughly three times the size of Greenland.

It can expose people living at far northern latitudes to high levels of ultraviolet light radiation.

It appears that it will close on its own in a few weeks an ESA researcher stated.

And another detour

The Yellowstone Caldera is a supervolcano spreading below Wyoming, Montana, and Idaho. Image: The Express UK

If this supervolcano erupts it will cause massive destruction. It has only erupted 3 times before: 2.1 million years ago, 1.3 million years ago, and 640,000 years ago.

Another view of what could be a future cataclysmic event. Image: Express UK

Sorry for the detours but these were events of great significance if they complete configurations. The earthquake at Yellowstone registered 7.5 magnitude.

This is a mock-up a supernova generated by a supercomputer.

Supernova choking on its own dust cloud. Image by LiveScience

Chandra. This supernova was first observed 2,000 years ago

RCW 86 This is the first supernova observed by NASA/ESA/JPL Image by NASA/ESA/JPL

SN 2013CU prior to it exploding into a supernova Image by Gal-Yam at Weizmann Observatory

This is a remnant of supernova Cassiopeia-A Image by NASA

Supernova shrapnel was discovered inside a meteorite. Image NASA

X-ray stripes in TYCO Supernova Image NASA/CRC/ESA

This is the youngest black hole ever found Image: NASA

Scientists measure supernovae using two scales: one is the energy of the explosion, and the other is the amount of that energy emitted as observable light, or radiation. Matt Nicholl is the lead author and also a lecturer in the School of Physics and Astronomy and the Institute of Gravitational Wave Astronomy at the University of Birmingham in England.

Thank you for stopping.

I could spend all day every day with my head in the stars.

Craig