A zombie star’s spiky filaments shed light on a 12th century supernova

Some 6,500 light-years from Earth lurks a zombie star cloaked in long tendrils of hot sulfur.

Nobody knows how those tendrils formed. But astronomers now know where they’re going. New observations, reported in the Nov. 1 Astrophysical Journal Letters, capture the 3-D structure and motion of debris left in the wake of a supernova that was seen to detonate almost 900 years ago.

“It’s a piece of the puzzle towards understanding this very bizarre [supernova] remnant,” says astronomer Tim Cunningham of the Harvard & Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in Cambridge, Mass.

.email-conversion { border: 1px solid #ffcccb; color: white; margin-top: 50px; background-image: url(“/wp-content/themes/sciencenews/client/src/images/[email protected]”); padding: 20px;

→ Continue reading at Science News

More from author

Related posts

Advertisment

Latest posts

Social media’s lax rules around misinformation worry election watchers

Leading up to the 2020 election, online platforms were policing misinformation. Now, days before the election, social media companies are taking a more...

Denver high school kids built an AI app to help immigrants vote

Some Denver high school kids from mostly immigrant families built an AI app to help their parents and people like them vote. It...

Dollar Tree CEO Rick Dreiling abruptly steps down | CNN Business

New York CNN  —  Embattled discount chain Dollar Tree announced its CEO and chairman, Rick Dreiling, had stepped down...