Astronomers
from Liverpool John Moores University and the University of Montpellier have
created a "early warning" system that can predict when a massive star
will die in a supernova explosion. The paper was published in the Royal
Astronomical Society's Monthly Notices.
Researchers
established in this new study that large stars (usually between 8 and 20 solar
masses) in their last phase of life, known as the'red supergiant' phase, will
abruptly become roughly a hundred times fainter in visible light in the last
few months before they die. The dimming is produced by a rapid buildup of
material surrounding the star, which obscures its brightness.
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It was previously unknown how long it took the star to accumulate this stuff. For the first time, scientists have modelled how red supergiants would seem when buried within these pre-explosion 'cocoons.'
Old
telescope archives include images of stars that burst around a year after the
snapshot was taken. The stars seem normal in these photos, indicating that they
have not yet formed the hypothesized circumstellar cocoon. This means that the
cocoon is created in less than a year, which is considered extremely fast.
The
paper's principal author, Benjamin Davies of Liverpool John Moores University,
states "The thick debris nearly entirely obscures the star, making it
appear 100 times fainter in the visible spectrum. This implies that you
wouldn't be able to view the star the day before it bursts." He continues,
"Until recently, scientists could only acquire comprehensive views of
supernovae hours after they occurred. With this early-warning system, we can
prepare to see them in real time, pointing the world's greatest telescopes
toward the precursor stars and watching them physically split apart in front of
our eyes."
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