Shockwave of an exploding star has been captured for the first time

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Shockwave Of An Exploding Star Has Been Captured For The First Time
Shockwave Of An Exploding Star Has Been Captured For The First Time

Astronomers have performed a great number of studies on collapsing stars, but capturing one in the optical wavelength or visible light during the early moments of explosion has proven elusive.

That changed recently, as an international team of astronomers searching through a wealth of data gathered by NASA's Kepler space telescope found what they have long been seeking.

See images of the Kepler space telescope:


The bright flash of the shockwave, or as astronomers call it the "shock breakout," pushes outward as the distant body turns from star to supernova.

Peter Garnavich from the University of Notre Dame who led the team noted, "In order to see something that happens on timescales of minutes, like a shock breakout, you want to have a camera continuously monitoring the sky. You don't know when a supernova is going to go off, and Kepler's vigilance allowed us to be a witness as the explosion began."

The star observed was a particularly massive one, estimated to be 500 times larger than our own sun.

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