An international team of astronomers led by the British “Southampton University” managed to The biggest cosmic explosion in history discover
According to the press release of this research team, the explosion has just been discovered More than ten times It is brighter than any known supernova. It is also the brightest cosmic event on record, the light emitted when a supermassive black hole is swallowed. triple It is brighter.
Scientists have claimed that the cosmic explosion, which is called AT2021lwx, is still ongoing and has lasted for more than three years. By comparison, most supernovae are only visible for a few months before collapsing. AT2021lwx burst at approx 8 billion light years It happened from us, which means that when it happens, the world is around 6 billion years old
How to form the biggest cosmic explosion
Based on their observations, they believe that the explosion was probably caused by a massive mass of hydrogen gas thousands of times larger than our Sun, disrupted by a supermassive black hole. During this incident, parts of this mass were swallowed by the black hole and its explosion wave was spread to outer space.
However, AT2021lwx is not the brightest cosmic explosion ever observed. In fact, that honor goes to a gamma-ray burst event called GRB 221009A that was discovered last year. Of course, GRB 221009A lasted for a short time, which means that the energy produced by AT2021lwx is much higher.
Although the team has been analyzing the giant explosion AT2021lwx since 2020, they still plan to collect more data like this report and measure it using different wavelengths, including X-rays. They will also use advanced computer simulations to gain a better understanding of the most powerful explosion ever seen.
