Colossal Supernova Leftover Lying in Space: One-of-Its-Kind, Biggest Discovery in Astronomy

Astronomers recently found a completely colossal supernova leftover, an expanding could of dust and gas, lurking in space.

A ScienceAlert report said the said discovery was a leftover from a stellar explosion, taking up an area of the sky almost 100 times that of the full moon, at a maximum 4,000-light-year distance from Earth.

It is remarkable what can be lying in wait in space, hidden by the eyes, preconceptions, and even technology's limitations.

A team of astronomers led by Germany-based Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics' Werner Becker has called the said remnant 'Hoinga,' derived from the medieval name of the hometown of Becker.

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Only Visible in eROSITA X-ray Telescope

As specified in the said report, Hoinga is only visible in X-rays and the only to one of the most powerful X-ray telescopes Becker's team built to date, the space-based eROSITA launched in 2019.

Astronomer Natasha Hurley-Walker from Curtain University node of the International Center for Radio Astronomy Research in Australia said the eROSITA telescope onboard the Russian-German SRG satellite is over 20 times more sensitive compared to its predecessor ROSAT telescope. Thus, they expect to discover new supernova leftovers in the years yet to come, although they were pleasantly astounded to have one occur straight away.

Hurley-Walker also said, adding to their excitement, the said remnant is the largest supernova leftover ever discovered through X-rays, when it comes to apparent size, roughly 90 times larger than the full moon.

Supernovae Triggers

Supernovae comprise two major triggers. One is a massive star's death. When they run out of material to fuse their interiors, the resultant drop in external thermal pressure means it is no longer adequate to keep the star from collapsing under gravity's inward pressure, and the entire thing explodes, collapsing the center into a black hole or neutron star, or destroying it.

The other trigger, the Cornell University study specified, is a supernova type that a white dwarf star, a low-mass progenitor's collapsed core, swallows so much material out of a binary companion that it turns unstable and comes to a similar end.

In the two supernovae triggers, the star's expanding outer material is blasted into space, creating shock fronts where it is slamming into the intergalactic medium. That, as the report indicated, is the supernova leftover.

Hoinga, a Surprise Remnant

Unknown supernova remnants in the past need to be detected by the eROSITA telescope. Still, even so, the Hoinga remnant was said to be a surprise as it was found so rapidly, but due to the location, it was far from the galactic plane, where most of the stars of the Milky Way, and thus supernova remnants reside.

The research team double-checked their results against data from radio astronomy and discovered that faint evidence of Hoinga dating back 10 years ago.

By sifting through archival radio data, Hurley-Walker explained, they discovered Hoinga had been lying there awaiting discovery in surveys up to 10 years old, although since it was high above the Milky Way's plane, it was missed.

Related information about eROSITA is shown on APOD Podcast's YouTube video below: