When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission.Credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight CenterNASA’s Fermi Gamma-ray spacecraft has observed a super-bright, supercharged supernova explosion that may have been powered up by a highly magnetic dead star, a type of neutron star called a magnetar. This magnetar would have actually been born in the supernova itself, forced into existence when the core of a star that was much more massive than the sun underwent gravitational collapse at the end of its life.During these core-collapse supernovas, stellar cores with between one and two times the mass of the sun crush down to a radius of around 12 miles (20 kilometers) to create a neutron star, just like scientists say they see here. Not only does this rapid compression mean that neutron stars are made of material so dense that one teaspoon of it brought to Earth would weigh around 10 million tons (think 350 Statues of Liberty sitting on a teaspoon), but it also causes them to spin at rates as rapid as 700 times every second. The magnetic field lines of these dead stars are also forced together, intensifying the strength of neutron stars’ magnetic fields, which makes magnetars the most powerful magnetic objects in the known universe.AdvertisementAdvertisement”For nearly 20 years, astronomers have searched Fermi data for gamma-ray signals from thousands of supernovae, and while a few intriguing hints have been reported, none were definitive until now,” team leader Fabio Acero of the University of Paris-Saclay said in a statement.The superluminous supernova SN 2017egm was discovered by the European Space Agency’s Gaia mission on May 23, 2017. The circle shows the supernova shining bright within the massive barred spiral galaxy NGC 3191. | Credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight CenterA superbright supernovaOver the last few decades, astronomers have observed around 400 core collapse supernovas, which, depending on the initial mass of the dying star involved, can also birth a black hole. Some of these stellar explosions are described as “superluminous” because they produce in excess of 10 times as much visible light as other core-collapse supernovas.In 2024, scientists revealed they had successfully used Fermi to spot gamma-rays, the most energetic form of light, emitted from a supercharged supernova designated SN …
