ASASSN 15lh: Brightest, Hottest Superluminous Supernova in Universe

Summary: The Hubble Space Telescope includes among its 2016 tasks tracking far-off ASASSN 15lh, the brightest, hottest superluminous supernova in the universe.

"This is an artist's impression of the record-breakingly powerful, superluminous supernova ASASSN-15lh as it would appear from an exoplanet located about 10,000 light years away in the host galaxy of the supernova"; credit Beijing Planetarium/Jin Ma: Usage restrictions -- Image may be used with appropriate caption and credit, via EurekAlert!

Thirty astronomers are designating the fast-moving ASASSN 15lh superluminous supernova as the brightest, hottest exploding star ever known, according to a study published in the online journal Science Jan. 15, 2016.

Ten times more energy bursts forth from superluminous supernova ASASSN 15lh than from the total radiation released by the solar system’s sun in 10 billion years. The 30 co-researchers and co-writers consider the brightness 20 times the combined light of all Milky Way galaxy stars and 600 times greater than the sun. ASASSN 15lh delivers a brightness three times that of SN 2005ap, supernova discovered March 3, 2005, at 4.7 billion light years (1.441 billion parsecs) from Earth. It emits from the Indus constellation because of an object 10 miles (16 kilometers) across in its core.

The 98.42-inch (2.5-meter) Irénée du Pont telescope aperture furnishes a spectrum just seven days after the discovery of superluminous supernova ASASSN 15lh June 14, 2015.

Subo Dong of Kavli Institute for Astronomy and Astrophysics at China’s Peking University, gives reactions as “baffled. It didn’t look like any supernova we had seen.”

The dynamics of celestial mechanics in a universe expanding from a Big Bang to a possible Big Crunch or Big Rip has objects rapidly traversing space. Its red-shifted spectrum identifies superluminous supernova ASASSN 15lh, catalogued SN 2015L and nicknamed champagne supernova, as a far-off, fast-moving, super-bright object, not a transient light dot.

Research team members judge the distance of superluminous supernova ASASSN 15lh to be 3.8 billion light years away from Earth.

Astrophysicists know of one type of supernova involving a white dwarf siphoning matter from a binary star system companion until becoming so massive as to explode. They list another death star as involving a single, supermassive star depleting helium and hydrogen, drawing its mass inside its core and exploding under gravitational pressures. All Sky Automated Survey for Supernovae researchers mention the latter if ASASSN 15lh is a magnetar, not nuclear activity from a supermassive black hole or superstar.

Superluminous supernovae typically inhabit dim, star-forming dwarf galaxies even though superluminous supernova ASASSN 15lh is in a galaxy far brighter and hotter than the Milky Way.

A stellar explosion generally occurs every 50 years in the Milky Way galaxy even though cosmic dust obstructs the view.

The telescope survey currently provides coverage of the visible sky just two to three nights weekly even though team members anticipate doubling to four or six. The need to update images and information on superluminous supernova ASASSN 15lh qualifies the All Sky Automated Search for Supernovae team for access to the Hubble.

No extant records remain regarding observability of the massive supernova of 1667 in Cassopeia A even though astronomers in 1947 detected radio waves from the explosion. Records survive of a superbright supernova in SN1006 through observations in 1006 by astronomers in Africa and Asia and through radio waves registering in the 1960s.

ASASSN 15lh, as nuclear activity from a black hole, magnetar or superstar, transmits the greatest light show in the universe.

"These are pseudo-color images showing the host galaxy before the explosion of ASASSN-15lh taken by the Dark Energy Camera (DECam) [Left], and the supernova by the Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope Network (LCOGT) 1-meter telescope network [Right]"; credit Benjamin Shappee: Usage restrictions -- With credit, via EurekAlert!

Acknowledgment

My special thanks to talented artists and photographers/concerned organizations who make their fine images available on the internet.

Image credits:

"This is an artist's impression of the record-breakingly powerful, superluminous supernova ASASSN-15lh as it would appear from an exoplanet located about 10,000 light years away in the host galaxy of the supernova"; credit Beijing Planetarium/Jin Ma: Usage restrictions -- Image may be used with appropriate caption and credit, via EurekAlert! @ https://www.eurekalert.org/multimedia/572145; (EurekAlert! news release @ https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/539165); (former URL @ http://www.eurekalert.org/multimedia/pub/106524.php?from=315960)

"These are pseudo-color images showing the host galaxy before the explosion of ASASSN-15lh taken by the Dark Energy Camera (DECam) [Left], and the supernova by the Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope Network (LCOGT) 1-meter telescope network [Right]"; credit Benjamin Shappee: Usage restrictions -- With credit, via EurekAlert! @ https://www.eurekalert.org/multimedia/599555; (EurekAlert! news release @ https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/591623); (former URL @ https://www.eurekalert.org/multimedia/pub/106525.php?from=315960)

For further information:

Agence France-Presse. 15 January 2016. “Exploding Star Shines Brighter than any Supernova Seen.” Gadgets.NDTV  > Science > Science News.
Available @ http://gadgets.ndtv.com/science/news/exploding-star-shines-brighter-than-any-supernova-seen-790104

Billings, Lee. 14 January 2016. “Found: The Most Powerful Supernova Ever Seen.” Scientific American > The Sciences > Space.
Available @ http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/found-the-most-powerful-supernova-ever-seen/

Carnegie Institution. 14 January 2016. “Discovery: Most-Luminous Ever Supernova.” EurekAlert! > Public Releases.
Available @ http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2016-01/ci-dme011116.php

Crockett, Christopher. 14 January 2016. “Exploding Star Is the Brightest Supernova Ever Seen.” The Society for Science News > Science Ticker > Astronomy.
Available @ https://www.sciencenews.org/blog/science-ticker/exploding-star-brightest-supernova-ever-seen

Dong, Subo; Shappee, B.J.; Prieto, J.L.; Jha, S.W.; Stanek, K.Z.; Holoien, T.W.-S.; Kochanek, C.S.; Thompson, T.A.; Morrell, N.; Thompson, I.B.; Basu, U.; Beacom, J.F.; Bersier, D.; Brimacombe, J.; Brown, J.S.; Bufano, F.; Chen, Ping; Conseil, E.; Danilet, A.B.; Falco, E.; Grupe, D.; Kiyota, S.; Masi, G.; Nicholls, B.; Olivares E., F.; Pignata, G.; Pojmanski, G.; Simonian, G.V. ; Szczygiel, D.M.; and Woźniak, P.R. 15 January 2016. “ASASSN-15lh: A Highly Super-luminous Supernova.” Science 351 (6270): 257–260. DOI: 10.1126/science.aac9613
Available @ http://science.sciencemag.org/content/351/6270/257

Grush, Loren. 14 January 2016. “Supernova in Distant Galaxy May Be the Brightest and Most Powerful Ever Seen.” The Verge > Science > Space.
Available @ http://www.theverge.com/2016/1/14/10769296/supernova-super-bright-collapsed-star-hubble-telescope

“Most-Luminous Supernova Ever Discovered.” Phys.Org > Astronomy & Space > Astronomy > Jan. 14, 2016.
Available @ http://phys.org/news/2016-01-most-luminous-supernova.html

Ohio State University. 14 January 2016. “What Is 10 Miles Across, but Powers an Explosion Brighter than the Milky Way?” Science News > Physical/Tech > Space & Time.
Available @ http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2016/01/160114152321.htm

Science Magazine @sciencemagazine. 19 January 2016. "The most luminous supernova to date: astronomers report on ASASSN-15lh." Twitter.
Available @ https://twitter.com/sciencemagazine/status/689538214424625154

Star News. 14 July 2015. "Astronomers observe record bright supernova in 500 billion times higher than the brightness." YouTube.
Available @ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K4Z97YqJSQg

Thomson, Jason. 14 January 2016. “Astronomers Spot Brightest Supernova in History.” The Christian Science Monitor > Science.
Available @ http://www.csmonitor.com/Science/2016/0114/Astronomers-spot-brightest-supernova-in-history

Young, Monica. 12 July 2015. “The Most Luminous Supernova.” Sky and Telescope > Astronomy > News.
Available @ http://www.skyandtelescope.com/astronomy-news/most-luminous-supernova-07131522/