{"id":153964,"date":"2022-01-06T04:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-01-06T14:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/?p=153964"},"modified":"2022-01-07T14:23:08","modified_gmt":"2022-01-08T00:23:08","slug":"explosion-of-supergiant-star-captured-by-uh-telescope","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/2022\/01\/06\/explosion-of-supergiant-star-captured-by-uh-telescope\/","title":{"rendered":"Explosion of supergiant star captured by <abbr>UH<\/abbr> telescope"},"content":{"rendered":"<span class=\"span-reading-time rt-reading-time\" style=\"display: block;\"><span class=\"rt-label rt-prefix\">Reading time: <\/span> <span class=\"rt-time\"> 2<\/span> <span class=\"rt-label rt-postfix\">minutes<\/span><\/span><div class=\"responsive-video-wrap-post\"><figure class=\"wp-block-embed wp-block-embed-youtube is-type-video is-provider-youtube epyt-figure\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\"><div class=\"epyt-video-wrapper\"><iframe  id=\"_ytid_99785\"  width=\"676\" height=\"676\"  data-origwidth=\"676\" data-origheight=\"676\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/iMtT-4fTkjQ?enablejsapi=1&origin=https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu&rel=0&autoplay=0&cc_load_policy=0&cc_lang_pref=&iv_load_policy=1&loop=0&fs=1&playsinline=0&autohide=2&theme=dark&color=red&controls=1&disablekb=0&\" class=\"__youtube_prefs__  no-lazyload\" title=\"Explosion of supergiant star captured by Â鶹´«Ã½telescope\"  allow=\"fullscreen; accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen data-no-lazy=\"1\" data-skipgform_ajax_framebjll=\"\"><\/iframe><\/div><\/div><\/figure><\/div>\n<p>Using a University of <span aria-label=\"Hawaii\">Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> telescope on Haleakal\u0101 and another on Maunakea, astronomers, for the very first time, imaged the dramatic end to a red supergiant star\u2019s life as it was happening. The massive star\u2019s rapid self-destruction and final death throes were captured before it collapsed into a Type <abbr title=\"Roman numeral two\">II<\/abbr> supernova.<\/p>\n<p>A team of researchers used the <abbr title=\"University of Hawaii\">UH<\/abbr> <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ifa.hawaii.edu\/\">Institute for Astronomy<\/a>-operated <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ifa.hawaii.edu\/research\/Pan-STARRS.shtml\">Panoramic Survey Telescope and Rapid Response System<\/a> (Pan-STARRS) on Maui and W. M. Keck Observatory on <span aria-label=\"Hawaii\">Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> Island observe the red supergiant during its last 130 days leading up to its deadly detonation. The observations were part of their ongoing Young Supernova Experiment (<abbr>YSE<\/abbr>) transient survey.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;This is a breakthrough in our understanding of what massive stars do moments before they die,&rdquo; said Wynn Jacobson-Gal\u00e1n, a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellow at University of California, Berkeley and lead author of the study. &ldquo;Direct detection of pre-supernova activity in a red supergiant star has never been observed before in an ordinary Type <abbr title=\"Roman numeral two\">II<\/abbr> supernova. For the first time, we watched a red supergiant star explode!&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>The discovery was recently published in <a href=\"https:\/\/iopscience.iop.org\/article\/10.3847\/1538-4357\/ac3f3a\"><em>The Astrophysical Journal<\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Related <em><abbr>UH<\/abbr> News<\/em> story: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/2021\/10\/24\/nasa-awards-15m-for-asteroid-hunting-telescopes-on-maui\/\"><abbr title=\"National Aeronautics and Space Administration\">NASA<\/abbr> awards $15<abbr>M<\/abbr> for asteroid hunting telescopes on Maui<\/a>, October 24, 2021<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Pan-STARRS first detected the doomed massive star in summer of 2020 via the huge amount of light radiating from the red supergiant. A few months later, in fall of 2020, a supernova lit the sky.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;This is an example of how repeatedly surveying the sky with Pan-STARRS brings new discoveries,&rdquo; said Ken Chambers, <abbr title=\"Institute for Astronomy\">IfA<\/abbr> astronomer and principal investigator of Pan-STARRS. &ldquo;Without the constant monitoring of the night sky with Pan-STARRS, this kind of discovery would not be possible.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>Researchers compared the celestial event to watching a ticking time bomb. The team continued to monitor <abbr>SN<\/abbr> 2020<abbr>tlf<\/abbr> after the explosion; based on data obtained from Keck Observatory\u2019s Deep Imaging and Multi-Object Spectrograph (<abbr>DEIMOS<\/abbr>) and Near Infrared Echellette Spectrograph (<abbr>NIRES<\/abbr>), they determined that <abbr>SN<\/abbr> 2020<abbr>tlf<\/abbr>\u2019s progenitor red supergiant star, located in the <abbr>NGC<\/abbr> 5731 galaxy about 120 million light-years away as seen from Earth, was 10 times more massive than the Sun.<\/p>\n<p>The discovery defies previous ideas of how red supergiant stars evolve right before blowing up. Prior to this, all red supergiants observed before exploding were relatively quiescent: they showed no evidence of violent eruptions or luminous emission, as was observed prior to <abbr>SN<\/abbr> 2020<abbr>tlf<\/abbr>. However, this novel detection of bright radiation coming from a red supergiant in the final year before exploding suggests that at least some of these stars must undergo significant changes in their internal structure that then results in the tumultuous ejection of gas moments before they collapse.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_153968\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-153968\" style=\"width: 676px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/01\/manoa-ifa-supergiant-star.jpg\" alt=\"supergiant star\" width=\"676\" height=\"381\" class=\"size-full wp-image-153968\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/01\/manoa-ifa-supergiant-star.jpg 676w, https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/01\/manoa-ifa-supergiant-star-300x169.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/01\/manoa-ifa-supergiant-star-130x73.jpg 130w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 676px) 100vw, 676px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-153968\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Artist\u2019s impression of a red supergiant star in the final year of its life emitting a tumultuous cloud of gas. (Credit: W. M. Keck Observatory\/Adam Makarenko)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>This effort is an example of <abbr>UH<\/abbr> M\u0101noa\u2019s goal of <a href=\"https:\/\/manoa.hawaii.edu\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/manoa-2025-strategic-plan.pdf#page=25\">Excellence in Research: Advancing the Research and Creative Work Enterprise<\/a> (<span class=\"small-text\"><abbr title=\"Portable Document Format\">PDF<\/abbr><\/span>), one of four goals identified in the <a href=\"https:\/\/manoa.hawaii.edu\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/manoa-2025-strategic-plan.pdf\">2015&#8211;25 Â鶹´«Ã½<\/a> (<span class=\"small-text\"><abbr>PDF<\/abbr><\/span>), updated in December 2020.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>For the first time, telescopes imaged the self-destruction and final death throes of a massive star.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[34,35,1363,158,9],"class_list":["post-153964","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-research","tag-astronomy","tag-institute-for-astronomy","tag-manoa-research","tag-publication","tag-uh-manoa","entry","has-media"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/153964","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=153964"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/153964\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":154044,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/153964\/revisions\/154044"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=153964"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=153964"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=153964"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}