New Findings Shed Light on Early Universe
Summary: Using the James Webb Telescope, astronomers have detected a supernova that occurred just 1.8 billion years after the Big Bang, along with 80 other supernovae in the early universe. These ancient explosions could help scientists uncover mysteries about how the universe evolved.
Main Body: The discovery of the most distant and oldest supernova ever observed, a stellar explosion that took place when the universe was just 1.8 billion years old, has been made possible by the James Webb Telescope.
Supernovae are transient objects, meaning their brightness changes over time. This makes the new collection of distant stellar explosions particularly intriguing, as studying them could provide critical insights into the otherwise unanswered questions about how the early universe evolved.
"We're basically opening up a new window into the transient universe," said Matthew Siebert, an astronomer who led the spectroscopic analysis of the supernovae. "Historically, every time we've done that we've found things that are really interesting – things we didn't expect."
There are two main types of supernovae: core-collapse and thermonuclear supernovae.
Core-Collapse Supernovae:
These explosions occur when stars at least eight times more massive than the sun run out of fuel and collapse in on themselves before exploding outward in a colossal blast.