124-624: The Calán/Tololo Supernova Survey was a supernova survey that ran from 1989 to 1995 at the University of Chile and the Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory to measure a Hubble diagram out to redshifts of 0.1. It was founded by Mario Hamuy , José Maza Sancho , Mark M. Phillips , and Nicholas B. Suntzeff in 1989 out of discussions at the UC Santa Cruz meeting on supernovae on how to improve
248-457: A neutron star or black hole , or is completely destroyed to form a diffuse nebula . The peak optical luminosity of a supernova can be comparable to that of an entire galaxy before fading over several weeks or months. The last supernova directly observed in the Milky Way was Kepler's Supernova in 1604, appearing not long after Tycho's Supernova in 1572, both of which were visible to
372-656: A "small cloud". In 964, he probably mentioned the Large Magellanic Cloud in his Book of Fixed Stars , referring to "Al Bakr of the southern Arabs", since at a declination of about 70° south it was not visible where he lived. It was not well known to Europeans until Magellan 's voyage in the 16th century. The Andromeda Galaxy was later independently noted by Simon Marius in 1612. In 1734, philosopher Emanuel Swedenborg in his Principia speculated that there might be other galaxies outside that were formed into galactic clusters that were minuscule parts of
496-452: A chain reaction of star-building that spreads throughout the gaseous region. Only when the available gas is nearly consumed or dispersed does the activity end. Starbursts are often associated with merging or interacting galaxies. The prototype example of such a starburst-forming interaction is M82 , which experienced a close encounter with the larger M81 . Irregular galaxies often exhibit spaced knots of starburst activity. A radio galaxy
620-684: A debate took place between Harlow Shapley and Heber Curtis , the Great Debate , concerning the nature of the Milky Way, spiral nebulae, and the dimensions of the universe. To support his claim that the Great Andromeda Nebula is an external galaxy, Curtis noted the appearance of dark lanes resembling the dust clouds in the Milky Way, as well as the significant Doppler shift. In 1922, the Estonian astronomer Ernst Öpik gave
744-536: A distance determination that supported the theory that the Andromeda Nebula is indeed a distant extra-galactic object. Using the new 100-inch Mt. Wilson telescope, Edwin Hubble was able to resolve the outer parts of some spiral nebulae as collections of individual stars and identified some Cepheid variables , thus allowing him to estimate the distance to the nebulae: they were far too distant to be part of
868-921: A few have well-established names, such as the Andromeda Galaxy , the Magellanic Clouds , the Whirlpool Galaxy , and the Sombrero Galaxy . Astronomers work with numbers from certain catalogues, such as the Messier catalogue , the NGC ( New General Catalogue ), the IC ( Index Catalogue ), the CGCG ( Catalogue of Galaxies and of Clusters of Galaxies ), the MCG ( Morphological Catalogue of Galaxies ),
992-528: A few nearby bright galaxies, like the Andromeda Galaxy , began resolving them into huge conglomerations of stars, but based simply on the apparent faintness and sheer population of stars, the true distances of these objects placed them well beyond the Milky Way. For this reason they were popularly called island universes , but this term quickly fell into disuse, as the word universe implied the entirety of existence. Instead, they became known simply as galaxies. Millions of galaxies have been catalogued, but only
1116-418: A function of their radius (or distance from their cores) falls off more slowly than their smaller counterparts. The formation of these cD galaxies remains an active area of research, but the leading model is that they are the result of the mergers of smaller galaxies in the environments of dense clusters, or even those outside of clusters with random overdensities. These processes are the mechanisms that drive
1240-412: A journal article came the following year in a publication by Knut Lundmark , who may have coined it independently. Compared to a star's entire history, the visual appearance of a supernova is very brief, sometimes spanning several months, so that the chances of observing one with the naked eye are roughly once in a lifetime. Only a tiny fraction of the 100 billion stars in a typical galaxy have
1364-429: A low portion of open clusters and a reduced rate of new star formation. Instead, they are dominated by generally older, more evolved stars that are orbiting the common center of gravity in random directions. The stars contain low abundances of heavy elements because star formation ceases after the initial burst. In this sense they have some similarity to the much smaller globular clusters . The largest galaxies are
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#17327799734631488-453: A non-rotating star), it would no longer be able to support the bulk of its mass through electron degeneracy pressure and would begin to collapse. However, the current view is that this limit is not normally attained; increasing temperature and density inside the core ignite carbon fusion as the star approaches the limit (to within about 1%) before collapse is initiated. In contrast, for a core primarily composed of oxygen, neon and magnesium,
1612-557: A one or two-letter designation. The first 26 supernovae of the year are designated with a capital letter from A to Z . Next, pairs of lower-case letters are used: aa , ab , and so on. Hence, for example, SN 2003C designates the third supernova reported in the year 2003. The last supernova of 2005, SN 2005nc, was the 367th (14 × 26 + 3 = 367). Since 2000, professional and amateur astronomers have been finding several hundred supernovae each year (572 in 2007, 261 in 2008, 390 in 2009; 231 in 2013). Historical supernovae are known simply by
1736-417: A pattern that can be theoretically shown to result from a disturbance in a uniformly rotating mass of stars. Like the stars, the spiral arms rotate around the center, but they do so with constant angular velocity . The spiral arms are thought to be areas of high-density matter, or " density waves ". As stars move through an arm, the space velocity of each stellar system is modified by the gravitational force of
1860-400: A plane, the majority of mass in spiral galaxies exists in a roughly spherical halo of dark matter which extends beyond the visible component, as demonstrated by the universal rotation curve concept. Spiral galaxies consist of a rotating disk of stars and interstellar medium, along with a central bulge of generally older stars. Extending outward from the bulge are relatively bright arms. In
1984-675: A rare type of very fast supernova with unusually strong calcium lines in their spectra. Models suggest they occur when material is accreted from a helium -rich companion rather than a hydrogen -rich star. Because of helium lines in their spectra, they can resemble type Ib supernovae, but are thought to have very different progenitors. The supernovae of type II can also be sub-divided based on their spectra. While most type II supernovae show very broad emission lines which indicate expansion velocities of many thousands of kilometres per second , some, such as SN 2005gl , have relatively narrow features in their spectra. These are called type IIn, where
2108-438: A reserve of cold gas that forms giant molecular clouds . Some galaxies have been observed to form stars at an exceptional rate, which is known as a starburst . If they continue to do so, they would consume their reserve of gas in a time span less than the galaxy's lifespan. Hence starburst activity usually lasts only about ten million years, a relatively brief period in a galaxy's history. Starburst galaxies were more common during
2232-435: A rotating bar structure in the center of this galaxy. With improved radio telescopes , hydrogen gas could also be traced in other galaxies. In the 1970s, Vera Rubin uncovered a discrepancy between observed galactic rotation speed and that predicted by the visible mass of stars and gas. Today, the galaxy rotation problem is thought to be explained by the presence of large quantities of unseen dark matter . Beginning in
2356-488: A single larger galaxy; the Milky Way has at least a dozen such satellites, with an estimated 300–500 yet to be discovered. Most of the information we have about dwarf galaxies come from observations of the local group , containing two spiral galaxies, the Milky Way and Andromeda, and many dwarf galaxies. These dwarf galaxies are classified as either irregular or dwarf elliptical / dwarf spheroidal galaxies . A study of 27 Milky Way neighbors found that in all dwarf galaxies,
2480-419: A smaller companion galaxy—that as the two galaxy centers approach, they start to oscillate around a center point, and the oscillation creates gravitational ripples forming the shells of stars, similar to ripples spreading on water. For example, galaxy NGC 3923 has over 20 shells. Spiral galaxies resemble spiraling pinwheels . Though the stars and other visible material contained in such a galaxy lie mostly on
2604-703: A stellar companion to raise its core temperature enough to ignite carbon fusion , at which point it undergoes runaway nuclear fusion, completely disrupting it. There are three avenues by which this detonation is theorised to happen: stable accretion of material from a companion, the collision of two white dwarfs, or accretion that causes ignition in a shell that then ignites the core. The dominant mechanism by which type Ia supernovae are produced remains unclear. Despite this uncertainty in how type Ia supernovae are produced, type Ia supernovae have very uniform properties and are useful standard candles over intergalactic distances. Some calibrations are required to compensate for
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#17327799734632728-474: A supernova's spectrum contains lines of hydrogen (known as the Balmer series in the visual portion of the spectrum) it is classified Type II ; otherwise it is Type I . In each of these two types there are subdivisions according to the presence of lines from other elements or the shape of the light curve (a graph of the supernova's apparent magnitude as a function of time). Type I supernovae are subdivided on
2852-496: A thousand stars, to the largest galaxies known – supergiants with one hundred trillion stars, each orbiting its galaxy's center of mass . Most of the mass in a typical galaxy is in the form of dark matter , with only a few percent of that mass visible in the form of stars and nebulae. Supermassive black holes are a common feature at the centres of galaxies. Galaxies are categorised according to their visual morphology as elliptical , spiral , or irregular . The Milky Way
2976-528: Is 3C 236 , with lobes 15 million light-years across. It should however be noted that radio emissions are not always considered part of the main galaxy itself. A giant radio galaxy is a special class of objects characterized by the presence of radio lobes generated by relativistic jets powered by the central galaxy's supermassive black hole . Giant radio galaxies are different from ordinary radio galaxies in that they can extend to much larger scales, reaching upwards to several megaparsecs across, far larger than
3100-449: Is a dimensionless measure of the spectrum's frequency shift. High redshift searches for supernovae usually involve the observation of supernova light curves. These are useful for standard or calibrated candles to generate Hubble diagrams and make cosmological predictions. Supernova spectroscopy, used to study the physics and environments of supernovae, is more practical at low than at high redshift. Low redshift observations also anchor
3224-516: Is a galaxy with giant regions of radio emission extending well beyond its visible structure. These energetic radio lobes are powered by jets from its active galactic nucleus . Radio galaxies are classified according to their Fanaroff–Riley classification . The FR I class have lower radio luminosity and exhibit structures which are more elongated; the FR II class are higher radio luminosity. The correlation of radio luminosity and structure suggests that
3348-562: Is also used to observe distant, red-shifted galaxies that were formed much earlier. Water vapor and carbon dioxide absorb a number of useful portions of the infrared spectrum, so high-altitude or space-based telescopes are used for infrared astronomy . The first non-visual study of galaxies, particularly active galaxies, was made using radio frequencies . The Earth's atmosphere is nearly transparent to radio between 5 MHz and 30 GHz. The ionosphere blocks signals below this range. Large radio interferometers have been used to map
3472-430: Is an example of a spiral galaxy. It is estimated that there are between 200 billion ( 2 × 10 ) to 2 trillion galaxies in the observable universe . Most galaxies are 1,000 to 100,000 parsecs in diameter (approximately 3,000 to 300,000 light years ) and are separated by distances in the order of millions of parsecs (or megaparsecs). For comparison, the Milky Way has a diameter of at least 26,800 parsecs (87,400 ly) and
3596-531: Is called the Galactic Center . The Hubble classification system rates elliptical galaxies on the basis of their ellipticity, ranging from E0, being nearly spherical, up to E7, which is highly elongated. These galaxies have an ellipsoidal profile, giving them an elliptical appearance regardless of the viewing angle. Their appearance shows little structure and they typically have relatively little interstellar matter . Consequently, these galaxies also have
3720-500: Is debated and several alternative explanations, such as tidal disruption of a star by a black hole, have been suggested. SN 2013fs was recorded three hours after the supernova event on 6 October 2013, by the Intermediate Palomar Transient Factory . This is among the earliest supernovae caught after detonation, and it is the earliest for which spectra have been obtained, beginning six hours after
3844-454: Is generated, with matter reaching velocities on the order of 5,000–20,000 km/s , or roughly 3% of the speed of light. There is also a significant increase in luminosity, reaching an absolute magnitude of −19.3 (or 5 billion times brighter than the Sun), with little variation. The model for the formation of this category of supernova is a close binary star system. The larger of the two stars
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3968-461: Is given by the Hubble sequence . Since the Hubble sequence is entirely based upon visual morphological type (shape), it may miss certain important characteristics of galaxies such as star formation rate in starburst galaxies and activity in the cores of active galaxies . Many galaxies are thought to contain a supermassive black hole at their center. This includes the Milky Way, whose core region
4092-549: Is much variation in this type of event, and, in many cases, there may be no supernova at all, in which case they will have a less luminous light curve than the more normal SN type Ia. Abnormally bright type Ia supernovae occur when the white dwarf already has a mass higher than the Chandrasekhar limit, possibly enhanced further by asymmetry, but the ejected material will have less than normal kinetic energy. This super-Chandrasekhar-mass scenario can occur, for example, when
4216-444: Is nursing an unknown baby: she pushes the baby away, some of her milk spills, and it produces the band of light known as the Milky Way. In the astronomical literature, the capitalised word "Galaxy" is often used to refer to the Milky Way galaxy, to distinguish it from the other galaxies in the observable universe . The English term Milky Way can be traced back to a story by Geoffrey Chaucer c. 1380 : See yonder, lo,
4340-579: Is required. It is therefore important to discover them well before they reach their maximum. Amateur astronomers , who greatly outnumber professional astronomers, have played an important role in finding supernovae, typically by looking at some of the closer galaxies through an optical telescope and comparing them to earlier photographs. Toward the end of the 20th century, astronomers increasingly turned to computer-controlled telescopes and CCDs for hunting supernovae. While such systems are popular with amateurs, there are also professional installations such as
4464-496: Is separated from the Andromeda Galaxy , its nearest large neighbour, by just over 750,000 parsecs (2.5 million ly). The space between galaxies is filled with a tenuous gas (the intergalactic medium ) with an average density of less than one atom per cubic metre. Most galaxies are gravitationally organised into groups , clusters and superclusters . The Milky Way is part of the Local Group , which it dominates along with
4588-417: Is sometimes referred to as a flocculent spiral galaxy ; in contrast to the grand design spiral galaxy that has prominent and well-defined spiral arms. The speed in which a galaxy rotates is thought to correlate with the flatness of the disc as some spiral galaxies have thick bulges, while others are thin and dense. In spiral galaxies, the spiral arms do have the shape of approximate logarithmic spirals ,
4712-414: Is the first to evolve off the main sequence , and it expands to form a red giant . The two stars now share a common envelope, causing their mutual orbit to shrink. The giant star then sheds most of its envelope, losing mass until it can no longer continue nuclear fusion . At this point, it becomes a white dwarf star, composed primarily of carbon and oxygen. Eventually, the secondary star also evolves off
4836-464: The Andromeda Galaxy . A second supernova, SN 1895B , was discovered in NGC 5253 a decade later. Early work on what was originally believed to be simply a new category of novae was performed during the 1920s. These were variously called "upper-class Novae", "Hauptnovae", or "giant novae". The name "supernovae" is thought to have been coined by Walter Baade and Zwicky in lectures at Caltech in 1931. It
4960-652: The Andromeda Galaxy . The group is part of the Virgo Supercluster . At the largest scale , these associations are generally arranged into sheets and filaments surrounded by immense voids . Both the Local Group and the Virgo Supercluster are contained in a much larger cosmic structure named Laniakea . The word galaxy was borrowed via French and Medieval Latin from the Greek term for
5084-518: The Chandrasekhar limit ; electron capture ; pair-instability ; or photodisintegration . The table below lists the known reasons for core collapse in massive stars, the types of stars in which they occur, their associated supernova type, and the remnant produced. The metallicity is the proportion of elements other than hydrogen or helium, as compared to the Sun. The initial mass is the mass of
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5208-570: The Eta Carinae Great Outburst was noted. Supernovae in M101 (1909) and M83 (1923 and 1957) were also suggested as possible type IV or type V supernovae. These types would now all be treated as peculiar type II supernovae (IIpec), of which many more examples have been discovered, although it is still debated whether SN 1961V was a true supernova following an LBV outburst or an impostor. Supernova type codes, as summarised in
5332-557: The Hubble diagram using Type Ia supernovae . It was also motivated by the suggestion of Allan Sandage to restart a supernova survey after the Sandage and Tammann survey failed due to poor quality photographic plates in 1986. The Survey built on the original supernova survey of Maza done at the f/3 Maksutov Camera at the Cerro Roble Observatory of the University of Chile between 1979 and 1984. The Survey used
5456-607: The Katzman Automatic Imaging Telescope . The Supernova Early Warning System (SNEWS) project uses a network of neutrino detectors to give early warning of a supernova in the Milky Way galaxy. Neutrinos are subatomic particles that are produced in great quantities by a supernova, and they are not significantly absorbed by the interstellar gas and dust of the galactic disk. Supernova searches fall into two classes: those focused on relatively nearby events and those looking farther away. Because of
5580-526: The Large Magellanic Cloud , a satellite galaxy of the Milky Way. Theoretical studies indicate that most supernovae are triggered by one of two basic mechanisms: the sudden re-ignition of nuclear fusion in a white dwarf , or the sudden gravitational collapse of a massive star's core . Supernovae can expel several solar masses of material at speeds up to several percent of the speed of light . This drives an expanding shock wave into
5704-705: The Phillips relationship , as well as providing data for a Hubble diagram of Type II supernovae using the Expanding Photosphere method. In 1994, the Calán/Tololo team formed a parallel project, the High-Z Supernova Search Team , organized by Nicholas Suntzeff and Brian Schmidt , which later discovered the accelerated expansion of the universe in 1998. The calibration of Type Ia supernovae as standard candles led to
5828-487: The Sloan Digital Sky Survey . Greek philosopher Democritus (450–370 BCE) proposed that the bright band on the night sky known as the Milky Way might consist of distant stars. Aristotle (384–322 BCE), however, believed the Milky Way was caused by "the ignition of the fiery exhalation of some stars that were large, numerous and close together" and that the "ignition takes place in the upper part of
5952-525: The University of Nottingham , used 20 years of Hubble images to estimate that the observable universe contained at least two trillion ( 2 × 10 ) galaxies. However, later observations with the New Horizons space probe from outside the zodiacal light reduced this to roughly 200 billion ( 2 × 10 ). Galaxies come in three main types: ellipticals, spirals, and irregulars. A slightly more extensive description of galaxy types based on their appearance
6076-579: The atmosphere , in the region of the World that is continuous with the heavenly motions ." Neoplatonist philosopher Olympiodorus the Younger ( c. 495 –570 CE) was critical of this view, arguing that if the Milky Way was sublunary (situated between Earth and the Moon) it should appear different at different times and places on Earth, and that it should have parallax , which it did not. In his view,
6200-413: The expansion of the universe , the distance to a remote object with a known emission spectrum can be estimated by measuring its Doppler shift (or redshift ); on average, more-distant objects recede with greater velocity than those nearby, and so have a higher redshift. Thus the search is split between high redshift and low redshift, with the boundary falling around a redshift range of z=0.1–0.3, where z
6324-416: The naked eye . The remnants of more recent supernovae have been found, and observations of supernovae in other galaxies suggest they occur in the Milky Way on average about three times every century. A supernova in the Milky Way would almost certainly be observable through modern astronomical telescopes. The most recent naked-eye supernova was SN 1987A , which was the explosion of a blue supergiant star in
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#17327799734636448-533: The plural form supernovae ( /- v iː / ) or supernovas and is often abbreviated as SN or SNe. It is derived from the Latin word nova , meaning ' new ' , which refers to what appears to be a temporary new bright star. Adding the prefix "super-" distinguishes supernovae from ordinary novae, which are far less luminous. The word supernova was coined by Walter Baade and Fritz Zwicky , who began using it in astrophysics lectures in 1931. Its first use in
6572-603: The spectra invisible to humans (radio telescopes, infrared cameras, and x-ray telescopes ) allows detection of other galaxies that are not detected by Hubble. Particularly, surveys in the Zone of Avoidance (the region of sky blocked at visible-light wavelengths by the Milky Way) have revealed a number of new galaxies. A 2016 study published in The Astrophysical Journal , led by Christopher Conselice of
6696-519: The type-cD galaxies . First described in 1964 by a paper by Thomas A. Matthews and others, they are a subtype of the more general class of D galaxies, which are giant elliptical galaxies, except that they are much larger. They are popularly known as the supergiant elliptical galaxies and constitute the largest and most luminous galaxies known. These galaxies feature a central elliptical nucleus with an extensive, faint halo of stars extending to megaparsec scales. The profile of their surface brightnesses as
6820-579: The "Great Andromeda Nebula", as the Andromeda Galaxy, Messier object M31 , was then known. Searching the photographic record, he found 11 more novae . Curtis noticed that these novae were, on average, 10 magnitudes fainter than those that occurred within this galaxy. As a result, he was able to come up with a distance estimate of 150,000 parsecs . He became a proponent of the so-called "island universes" hypothesis, which holds that spiral nebulae are actually independent galaxies. In 1920
6944-431: The "n" stands for "narrow". A few supernovae, such as SN 1987K and SN 1993J , appear to change types: they show lines of hydrogen at early times, but, over a period of weeks to months, become dominated by lines of helium. The term "type IIb" is used to describe the combination of features normally associated with types II and Ib. Type II supernovae with normal spectra dominated by broad hydrogen lines that remain for
7068-525: The 1990s, the Hubble Space Telescope yielded improved observations. Among other things, its data helped establish that the missing dark matter in this galaxy could not consist solely of inherently faint and small stars. The Hubble Deep Field , an extremely long exposure of a relatively empty part of the sky, provided evidence that there are about 125 billion ( 1.25 × 10 ) galaxies in the observable universe. Improved technology in detecting
7192-539: The CTIO Curtis Schmidt telescope with IIa-O photographic plates, each plate covering a field of 25 sq-deg on the sky. The plates were developed and sent to Santiago Chile the next morning and searched for supernovae at the Department of Astronomy at the University of Chile . Any supernova candidates were then observed the next night using the 0.9m telescope at CTIO with a CCD camera. This was one of
7316-550: The Galaxyë Which men clepeth the Milky Wey , For hit is whyt. Galaxies were initially discovered telescopically and were known as spiral nebulae . Most 18th- to 19th-century astronomers considered them as either unresolved star clusters or anagalactic nebulae , and were just thought of as a part of the Milky Way, but their true composition and natures remained a mystery. Observations using larger telescopes of
7440-432: The Hubble classification scheme, spiral galaxies are listed as type S , followed by a letter ( a , b , or c ) which indicates the degree of tightness of the spiral arms and the size of the central bulge. An Sa galaxy has tightly wound, poorly defined arms and possesses a relatively large core region. At the other extreme, an Sc galaxy has open, well-defined arms and a small core region. A galaxy with poorly defined arms
7564-462: The Milky Way galaxy was "a myriad of tiny stars packed together in the sphere of the fixed stars." Actual proof of the Milky Way consisting of many stars came in 1610 when the Italian astronomer Galileo Galilei used a telescope to study it and discovered it was composed of a huge number of faint stars. In 1750, English astronomer Thomas Wright , in his An Original Theory or New Hypothesis of
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#17327799734637688-431: The Milky Way was a flattened disk of stars, and that some of the nebulae visible in the night sky might be separate Milky Ways. Toward the end of the 18th century, Charles Messier compiled a catalog containing the 109 brightest celestial objects having nebulous appearance. Subsequently, William Herschel assembled a catalog of 5,000 nebulae. In 1845, Lord Rosse examined the nebulae catalogued by Herschel and observed
7812-493: The Milky Way was celestial. According to Mohani Mohamed, Arabian astronomer Ibn al-Haytham (965–1037) made the first attempt at observing and measuring the Milky Way's parallax, and he thus "determined that because the Milky Way had no parallax, it must be remote from the Earth, not belonging to the atmosphere." Persian astronomer al-Biruni (973–1048) proposed the Milky Way galaxy was "a collection of countless fragments of
7936-405: The Milky Way, galaxías (kúklos) γαλαξίας ( κύκλος ) 'milky (circle)', named after its appearance as a milky band of light in the sky. In Greek mythology , Zeus places his son, born by a mortal woman, the infant Heracles , on Hera 's breast while she is asleep so the baby will drink her divine milk and thus become immortal. Hera wakes up while breastfeeding and then realises she
8060-481: The Milky Way. Despite the prominence of large elliptical and spiral galaxies, most galaxies are dwarf galaxies. They are relatively small when compared with other galactic formations, being about one hundredth the size of the Milky Way, with only a few billion stars. Blue compact dwarf galaxies contains large clusters of young, hot, massive stars . Ultra-compact dwarf galaxies have been discovered that are only 100 parsecs across. Many dwarf galaxies may orbit
8184-402: The Milky Way. In 1926 Hubble produced a classification of galactic morphology that is used to this day. Advances in astronomy have always been driven by technology. After centuries of success in optical astronomy , infrared astronomy was attempted in the 1830s, but only blossomed in the early 1900s. Radio astronomy was born in the 1930s, and matured by the 1950s and 1960s. The problem
8308-648: The UGC ( Uppsala General Catalogue of Galaxies), and the PGC ( Catalogue of Principal Galaxies , also known as LEDA). All the well-known galaxies appear in one or more of these catalogues but each time under a different number. For example, Messier 109 (or "M109") is a spiral galaxy having the number 109 in the catalogue of Messier. It also has the designations NGC 3992, UGC 6937, CGCG 269–023, MCG +09-20-044, and PGC 37617 (or LEDA 37617), among others. Millions of fainter galaxies are known by their identifiers in sky surveys such as
8432-543: The Universe , correctly speculated that it might be a rotating body of a huge number of stars held together by gravitational forces, akin to the Solar System but on a much larger scale, and that the resulting disk of stars could be seen as a band on the sky from a perspective inside it. In his 1755 treatise, Immanuel Kant elaborated on Wright's idea about the Milky Way's structure. The first project to describe
8556-407: The active jets emitted from active nuclei. Ultraviolet and X-ray telescopes can observe highly energetic galactic phenomena. Ultraviolet flares are sometimes observed when a star in a distant galaxy is torn apart from the tidal forces of a nearby black hole. The distribution of hot gas in galactic clusters can be mapped by X-rays. The existence of supermassive black holes at the cores of galaxies
8680-541: The actual explosion. The star is located in a spiral galaxy named NGC 7610 , 160 million light-years away in the constellation of Pegasus. The supernova SN 2016gkg was detected by amateur astronomer Victor Buso from Rosario , Argentina, on 20 September 2016. It was the first time that the initial "shock breakout" from an optical supernova had been observed. The progenitor star has been identified in Hubble Space Telescope images from before its collapse. Astronomer Alex Filippenko noted: "Observations of stars in
8804-688: The basis of their spectra, with type Ia showing a strong ionised silicon absorption line. Type I supernovae without this strong line are classified as type Ib and Ic, with type Ib showing strong neutral helium lines and type Ic lacking them. Historically, the light curves of type I supernovae were seen as all broadly similar, too much so to make useful distinctions. While variations in light curves have been studied, classification continues to be made on spectral grounds rather than light-curve shape. A small number of type Ia supernovae exhibit unusual features, such as non-standard luminosity or broadened light curves, and these are typically categorised by referring to
8928-543: The capacity to become a supernova, the ability being restricted to those having high mass and those in rare kinds of binary star systems with at least one white dwarf . The earliest record of a possible supernova, known as HB9, was likely viewed by an unknown prehistoric people of the Indian subcontinent and recorded on a rock carving in the Burzahama region of Kashmir , dated to 4500 ± 1000 BC . Later, SN 185
9052-449: The center. A different method by Harlow Shapley based on the cataloguing of globular clusters led to a radically different picture: a flat disk with diameter approximately 70 kiloparsecs and the Sun far from the centre. Both analyses failed to take into account the absorption of light by interstellar dust present in the galactic plane ; but after Robert Julius Trumpler quantified this effect in 1930 by studying open clusters ,
9176-749: The central mass is approximately 10 million solar masses , regardless of whether it has thousands or millions of stars. This suggests that galaxies are largely formed by dark matter , and that the minimum size may indicate a form of warm dark matter incapable of gravitational coalescence on a smaller scale. Interactions between galaxies are relatively frequent, and they can play an important role in galactic evolution . Near misses between galaxies result in warping distortions due to tidal interactions , and may cause some exchange of gas and dust. Collisions occur when two galaxies pass directly through each other and have sufficient relative momentum not to merge. The stars of interacting galaxies usually do not collide, but
9300-402: The collapsing white dwarf will typically form a neutron star . In this case, only a fraction of the star's mass will be ejected during the collapse. Within a few seconds of the collapse process, a substantial fraction of the matter in the white dwarf undergoes nuclear fusion, releasing enough energy (1– 2 × 10 J ) to unbind the star in a supernova. An outwardly expanding shock wave
9424-454: The core against its own gravity; passing this threshold is the cause of all types of supernova except type Ia. The collapse may cause violent expulsion of the outer layers of the star resulting in a supernova. However, if the release of gravitational potential energy is insufficient, the star may instead collapse into a black hole or neutron star with little radiated energy. Core collapse can be caused by several different mechanisms: exceeding
9548-442: The core, or else due to a tidal interaction with another galaxy. Many barred spiral galaxies are active, possibly as a result of gas being channeled into the core along the arms. Our own galaxy, the Milky Way , is a large disk-shaped barred-spiral galaxy about 30 kiloparsecs in diameter and a kiloparsec thick. It contains about two hundred billion (2×10 ) stars and has a total mass of about six hundred billion (6×10 ) times
9672-399: The core, then merges into the spiral arm structure. In the Hubble classification scheme, these are designated by an SB , followed by a lower-case letter ( a , b or c ) which indicates the form of the spiral arms (in the same manner as the categorization of normal spiral galaxies). Bars are thought to be temporary structures that can occur as a result of a density wave radiating outward from
9796-400: The distance to their host galaxies. A second model for the formation of type Ia supernovae involves the merger of two white dwarf stars, with the combined mass momentarily exceeding the Chandrasekhar limit. This is sometimes referred to as the double-degenerate model, as both stars are degenerate white dwarfs. Due to the possible combinations of mass and chemical composition of the pair there
9920-401: The earliest example showing similar features. For example, the sub-luminous SN 2008ha is often referred to as SN 2002cx -like or class Ia-2002cx. A small proportion of type Ic supernovae show highly broadened and blended emission lines which are taken to indicate very high expansion velocities for the ejecta. These have been classified as type Ic-BL or Ic-bl. Calcium-rich supernovae are
10044-411: The event sufficiently for it to go unnoticed. The situation for Cassiopeia A is less clear; infrared light echoes have been detected showing that it was not in a region of especially high extinction. SN's identification With the development of the astronomical telescope , observation and discovery of fainter and more distant supernovae became possible. The first such observation was of SN 1885A in
10168-558: The extra mass is supported by differential rotation . There is no formal sub-classification for non-standard type Ia supernovae. It has been proposed that a group of sub-luminous supernovae that occur when helium accretes onto a white dwarf should be classified as type Iax . This type of supernova may not always completely destroy the white dwarf progenitor and could leave behind a zombie star . One specific type of supernova originates from exploding white dwarfs, like type Ia, but contains hydrogen lines in their spectra, possibly because
10292-451: The first moments they begin exploding provide information that cannot be directly obtained in any other way." The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has significantly advanced our understanding of supernovae by identifying around 80 new instances through its JWST Advanced Deep Extragalactic Survey (JADES) program. This includes the most distant spectroscopically confirmed supernova at a redshift of 3.6, indicating its explosion occurred when
10416-405: The first studies done in astronomy where the telescope time was scheduled to observe objects not yet discovered. The survey discovered 50 supernovae between 1990 and 1993, of which 32 were Type Ia supernovae . The survey provided a uniform photometric and spectroscopic dataset of all classes of supernovae, which led to the discovery of a method of using Type Ia supernovae as standard candles ,
10540-400: The formation of fossil groups or fossil clusters, where a large, relatively isolated, supergiant elliptical resides in the middle of the cluster and are surrounded by an extensive cloud of X-rays as the residue of these galactic collisions. Another older model posits the phenomenon of cooling flow , where the heated gases in clusters collapses towards their centers as they cool, forming stars in
10664-590: The galaxies' original morphology. If one of the galaxies is much more massive than the other, the result is known as cannibalism , where the more massive larger galaxy remains relatively undisturbed, and the smaller one is torn apart. The Milky Way galaxy is currently in the process of cannibalizing the Sagittarius Dwarf Elliptical Galaxy and the Canis Major Dwarf Galaxy . Stars are created within galaxies from
10788-448: The gas and dust within the two forms interacts, sometimes triggering star formation. A collision can severely distort the galaxies' shapes, forming bars, rings or tail-like structures. At the extreme of interactions are galactic mergers, where the galaxies' relative momentums are insufficient to allow them to pass through each other. Instead, they gradually merge to form a single, larger galaxy. Mergers can result in significant changes to
10912-439: The gradual change in properties or different frequencies of abnormal luminosity supernovae at high redshift, and for small variations in brightness identified by light curve shape or spectrum. There are several means by which a supernova of this type can form, but they share a common underlying mechanism. If a carbon - oxygen white dwarf accreted enough matter to reach the Chandrasekhar limit of about 1.44 solar masses (for
11036-470: The higher density. (The velocity returns to normal after the stars depart on the other side of the arm.) This effect is akin to a "wave" of slowdowns moving along a highway full of moving cars. The arms are visible because the high density facilitates star formation, and therefore they harbor many bright and young stars. A majority of spiral galaxies, including the Milky Way galaxy, have a linear, bar-shaped band of stars that extends outward to either side of
11160-564: The increasing number of discoveries has regularly led to the additional use of three-letter designations. After zz comes aaa, then aab, aac, and so on. For example, the last supernova retained in the Asiago Supernova Catalogue ; when it was terminated on 31 December 2017 bears the designation SN 2017jzp. Astronomers classify supernovae according to their light curves and the absorption lines of different chemical elements that appear in their spectra . If
11284-431: The life of the decline are classified on the basis of their light curves. The most common type shows a distinctive "plateau" in the light curve shortly after peak brightness where the visual luminosity stays relatively constant for several months before the decline resumes. These are called type II-P referring to the plateau. Less common are type II-L supernovae that lack a distinct plateau. The "L" signifies "linear" although
11408-437: The light curve is extremely consistent across normal type Ia supernovae, having a maximum absolute magnitude of about −19.3. This is because typical type Ia supernovae arise from a consistent type of progenitor star by gradual mass acquisition, and explode when they acquire a consistent typical mass, giving rise to very similar supernova conditions and behaviour. This allows them to be used as a secondary standard candle to measure
11532-487: The light curve is not actually a straight line. Supernovae that do not fit into the normal classifications are designated peculiar, or "pec". Zwicky defined additional supernovae types based on a very few examples that did not cleanly fit the parameters for type I or type II supernovae. SN 1961i in NGC 4303 was the prototype and only member of the type III supernova class, noted for its broad light curve maximum and broad hydrogen Balmer lines that were slow to develop in
11656-411: The low-distance end of the Hubble curve , which is a plot of distance versus redshift for visible galaxies. As survey programmes rapidly increase the number of detected supernovae, collated collections of observations (light decay curves, astrometry, pre-supernova observations, spectroscopy) have been assembled. The Pantheon data set, assembled in 2018, detailed 1048 supernovae. In 2021, this data set
11780-492: The main sequence to form a red giant. Matter from the giant is accreted by the white dwarf, causing the latter to increase in mass. The exact details of initiation and of the heavy elements produced in the catastrophic event remain unclear. Type Ia supernovae produce a characteristic light curve—the graph of luminosity as a function of time—after the event. This luminosity is generated by the radioactive decay of nickel -56 through cobalt -56 to iron -56. The peak luminosity of
11904-421: The mass of the Sun. Recently, researchers described galaxies called super-luminous spirals. They are very large with an upward diameter of 437,000 light-years (compared to the Milky Way's 87,400 light-year diameter). With a mass of 340 billion solar masses, they generate a significant amount of ultraviolet and mid-infrared light. They are thought to have an increased star formation rate around 30 times faster than
12028-469: The most distant supernovae observed in 2003 appeared dimmer than expected. This supports the view that the expansion of the universe is accelerating . Techniques were developed for reconstructing supernovae events that have no written records of being observed. The date of the Cassiopeia A supernova event was determined from light echoes off nebulae , while the age of supernova remnant RX J0852.0-4622
12152-564: The naked eye, had a notable influence on the development of astronomy in Europe because they were used to argue against the Aristotelian idea that the universe beyond the Moon and planets was static and unchanging. Johannes Kepler began observing SN 1604 at its peak on 17 October 1604, and continued to make estimates of its brightness until it faded from naked eye view a year later. It was
12276-446: The nature of nebulous stars." Andalusian astronomer Avempace ( d. 1138) proposed that it was composed of many stars that almost touched one another, and appeared to be a continuous image due to the effect of refraction from sublunary material, citing his observation of the conjunction of Jupiter and Mars as evidence of this occurring when two objects were near. In the 14th century, Syrian-born Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyya proposed
12400-433: The newly ejected material. Galaxy A galaxy is a system of stars , stellar remnants , interstellar gas , dust , and dark matter bound together by gravity . The word is derived from the Greek galaxias ( γαλαξίας ), literally 'milky', a reference to the Milky Way galaxy that contains the Solar System . Galaxies, averaging an estimated 100 million stars, range in size from dwarfs with less than
12524-720: The precise measurements of the Hubble Constant H 0 and the deceleration parameter q 0 , the latter indicating the presence of a dark energy or cosmological constant dominating the mass/energy of the Universe . The Calán/Tololo data of nearby Type Ia supernovae were used as the anchors for the Hubble flow measurements both by the High-Z Supernova Search Team and the Supernova Cosmology Project . Their pioneering work
12648-472: The present picture of the Milky Way galaxy emerged. A few galaxies outside the Milky Way are visible on a dark night to the unaided eye , including the Andromeda Galaxy , Large Magellanic Cloud , Small Magellanic Cloud , and the Triangulum Galaxy . In the 10th century, Persian astronomer Abd al-Rahman al-Sufi made the earliest recorded identification of the Andromeda Galaxy, describing it as
12772-474: The process, a phenomenon observed in clusters such as Perseus , and more recently in the Phoenix Cluster . A shell galaxy is a type of elliptical galaxy where the stars in its halo are arranged in concentric shells. About one-tenth of elliptical galaxies have a shell-like structure, which has never been observed in spiral galaxies. These structures are thought to develop when a larger galaxy absorbs
12896-491: The second supernova to be observed in a generation, after Tycho Brahe observed SN 1572 in Cassiopeia . There is some evidence that the youngest known supernova in our galaxy, G1.9+0.3 , occurred in the late 19th century, considerably more recently than Cassiopeia A from around 1680. Neither was noted at the time. In the case of G1.9+0.3, high extinction from dust along the plane of the galactic disk could have dimmed
13020-475: The shape of the Milky Way and the position of the Sun was undertaken by William Herschel in 1785 by counting the number of stars in different regions of the sky. He produced a diagram of the shape of the galaxy with the Solar System close to the center . Using a refined approach, Kapteyn in 1920 arrived at the picture of a small (diameter about 15 kiloparsecs) ellipsoid galaxy with the Sun close to
13144-439: The sources in these two types of galaxies may differ. Radio galaxies can also be classified as giant radio galaxies (GRGs), whose radio emissions can extend to scales of megaparsecs (3.26 million light-years). Alcyoneus is an FR II class low-excitation radio galaxy which has the largest observed radio emission, with lobed structures spanning 5 megaparsecs (16×10 ly ). For comparison, another similarly sized giant radio galaxy
13268-452: The spectrum. SN 1961f in NGC 3003 was the prototype and only member of the type IV class, with a light curve similar to a type II-P supernova, with hydrogen absorption lines but weak hydrogen emission lines . The type V class was coined for SN 1961V in NGC 1058 , an unusual faint supernova or supernova impostor with a slow rise to brightness, a maximum lasting many months, and an unusual emission spectrum. The similarity of SN 1961V to
13392-576: The spiral structure of Messier object M51 , now known as the Whirlpool Galaxy. In 1912, Vesto M. Slipher made spectrographic studies of the brightest spiral nebulae to determine their composition. Slipher discovered that the spiral nebulae have high Doppler shifts , indicating that they are moving at a rate exceeding the velocity of the stars he had measured. He found that the majority of these nebulae are moving away from us. In 1917, Heber Doust Curtis observed nova S Andromedae within
13516-514: The star prior to the supernova event, given in multiples of the Sun's mass, although the mass at the time of the supernova may be much lower. Type IIn supernovae are not listed in the table. They can be produced by various types of core collapse in different progenitor stars, possibly even by type Ia white dwarf ignitions, although it seems that most will be from iron core collapse in luminous supergiants or hypergiants (including LBVs). The narrow spectral lines for which they are named occur because
13640-469: The supernova is expanding into a small dense cloud of circumstellar material. It appears that a significant proportion of supposed type IIn supernovae are supernova impostors, massive eruptions of LBV-like stars similar to the Great Eruption of Eta Carinae . In these events, material previously ejected from the star creates the narrow absorption lines and causes a shock wave through interaction with
13764-422: The surrounding interstellar medium , sweeping up an expanding shell of gas and dust observed as a supernova remnant. Supernovae are a major source of elements in the interstellar medium from oxygen to rubidium . The expanding shock waves of supernovae can trigger the formation of new stars . Supernovae are a major source of cosmic rays . They might also produce gravitational waves . The word supernova has
13888-409: The table above, are taxonomic : the type number is based on the light observed from the supernova, not necessarily its cause. For example, type Ia supernovae are produced by runaway fusion ignited on degenerate white dwarf progenitors, while the spectrally similar type Ib/c are produced from massive stripped progenitor stars by core collapse. A white dwarf star may accumulate sufficient material from
14012-498: The universe that extended far beyond what could be seen. These views "are remarkably close to the present-day views of the cosmos." In 1745, Pierre Louis Maupertuis conjectured that some nebula -like objects were collections of stars with unique properties, including a glow exceeding the light its stars produced on their own, and repeated Johannes Hevelius 's view that the bright spots were massive and flattened due to their rotation. In 1750, Thomas Wright correctly speculated that
14136-820: The universe was merely 1.8 billion years old. These findings offer crucial insights into the early universe's stellar evolution and the frequency of supernovae during its formative years. Because supernovae are relatively rare events within a galaxy, occurring about three times a century in the Milky Way, obtaining a good sample of supernovae to study requires regular monitoring of many galaxies. Today, amateur and professional astronomers are finding several hundred every year, some when near maximum brightness, others on old astronomical photographs or plates. Supernovae in other galaxies cannot be predicted with any meaningful accuracy. Normally, when they are discovered, they are already in progress. To use supernovae as standard candles for measuring distance, observation of their peak luminosity
14260-442: The universe's early history, but still contribute an estimated 15% to total star production. Starburst galaxies are characterized by dusty concentrations of gas and the appearance of newly formed stars, including massive stars that ionize the surrounding clouds to create H II regions . These stars produce supernova explosions, creating expanding remnants that interact powerfully with the surrounding gas. These outbursts trigger
14384-484: The white dwarf is surrounded by an envelope of hydrogen-rich circumstellar material . These supernovae have been dubbed type Ia/IIn , type Ian , type IIa and type IIan . The quadruple star HD 74438 , belonging to the open cluster IC 2391 the Vela constellation , has been predicted to become a non-standard type Ia supernova. Very massive stars can undergo core collapse when nuclear fusion becomes unable to sustain
14508-460: The year they occurred: SN 185, SN 1006, SN 1054, SN 1572 (called Tycho's Nova ) and SN 1604 ( Kepler's Star ). Since 1885 the additional letter notation has been used, even if there was only one supernova discovered that year (for example, SN 1885A, SN 1907A, etc.); this last happened with SN 1947A. SN , for SuperNova, is a standard prefix. Until 1987, two-letter designations were rarely needed; since 1988, they have been needed every year. Since 2016,
14632-467: Was cited in the award of the 2011 Nobel Prize in Physics Supernova A supernova ( pl. : supernovae or supernovas ) is a powerful and luminous explosion of a star . A supernova occurs during the last evolutionary stages of a massive star , or when a white dwarf is triggered into runaway nuclear fusion . The original object, called the progenitor , either collapses to
14756-405: Was confirmed through X-ray astronomy. In 1944, Hendrik van de Hulst predicted that microwave radiation with wavelength of 21 cm would be detectable from interstellar atomic hydrogen gas; and in 1951 it was observed. This radiation is not affected by dust absorption, and so its Doppler shift can be used to map the motion of the gas in this galaxy. These observations led to the hypothesis of
14880-561: Was documented by Chinese astronomers in 185 AD. The brightest recorded supernova was SN 1006 , which was observed in AD 1006 in the constellation of Lupus . This event was described by observers in China, Japan, Iraq, Egypt and Europe. The widely observed supernova SN 1054 produced the Crab Nebula . Supernovae SN 1572 and SN 1604 , the latest Milky Way supernovae to be observed with
15004-464: Was estimated from temperature measurements and the gamma ray emissions from the radioactive decay of titanium-44 . The most luminous supernova ever recorded is ASASSN-15lh , at a distance of 3.82 gigalight-years . It was first detected in June 2015 and peaked at 570 billion L ☉ , which is twice the bolometric luminosity of any other known supernova. The nature of this supernova
15128-495: Was expanded to 1701 light curves for 1550 supernovae taken from 18 different surveys, a 50% increase in under 3 years. Supernova discoveries are reported to the International Astronomical Union 's Central Bureau for Astronomical Telegrams , which sends out a circular with the name it assigns to that supernova. The name is formed from the prefix SN , followed by the year of discovery, suffixed with
15252-493: Was that air only allows visible light and radio waves to pass, with a little bit of near infrared. The first ultraviolet telescope was launched in 1968, and since then there's been major progress in all regions of the electromagnetic spectrum . The dust present in the interstellar medium is opaque to visual light. It is more transparent to far-infrared , which can be used to observe the interior regions of giant molecular clouds and galactic cores in great detail. Infrared
15376-503: Was used, as "super-Novae", in a journal paper published by Knut Lundmark in 1933, and in a 1934 paper by Baade and Zwicky. By 1938, the hyphen was no longer used and the modern name was in use. American astronomers Rudolph Minkowski and Fritz Zwicky developed the modern supernova classification scheme beginning in 1941. During the 1960s, astronomers found that the maximum intensities of supernovae could be used as standard candles , hence indicators of astronomical distances. Some of
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