The 'first light' images from the eROSITA X-ray telescope have revealed hidden stars in the Milky Way, and changes in a supernova that we saw explode over 30 years ago.
That supernova, SN 1987A, took place 168,000 light-years away in the Large Magellanic Cloud. It was the closest supernova to us since 1604 CE, and greatly informed our understanding of how some of these massive events occur.
In the image of the Large Magellanic Cloud, a few things stand out. There's a bubble-shaped object just off-centre; that's the superbubble 30 Doradus C, an X-ray cavity about 300 light-years across.
On the bottom left, a feature resembling a bird with outstretched wings is a binary called LMC X-1. It consists of a black hole 10 times the Sun's mass and a blue supergiant star 32 times the Sun's mass, on a tight orbital period of 3.9 days. The black hole is stripping material from the star, producing a flare of X-ray radiation.
Just above the bird-shaped binary, at about 9 o'clock, is an active galactic nucleus, a supermassive black hole actively accreting matter, far behind the Large Magellanic Cloud.
And in the middle, that very brightly shining star is SN 1987A. Yet, as bright as it is, the new eROSITA data shows that it is actually growing dimmer over time as the supernova's shockwave expands through the galaxy.
https://www.sciencealert.com/a-new-telescope-has-revealed-the-shockwave-from-a-1987-supernova
That supernova, SN 1987A, took place 168,000 light-years away in the Large Magellanic Cloud. It was the closest supernova to us since 1604 CE, and greatly informed our understanding of how some of these massive events occur.
In the image of the Large Magellanic Cloud, a few things stand out. There's a bubble-shaped object just off-centre; that's the superbubble 30 Doradus C, an X-ray cavity about 300 light-years across.
On the bottom left, a feature resembling a bird with outstretched wings is a binary called LMC X-1. It consists of a black hole 10 times the Sun's mass and a blue supergiant star 32 times the Sun's mass, on a tight orbital period of 3.9 days. The black hole is stripping material from the star, producing a flare of X-ray radiation.
Just above the bird-shaped binary, at about 9 o'clock, is an active galactic nucleus, a supermassive black hole actively accreting matter, far behind the Large Magellanic Cloud.
And in the middle, that very brightly shining star is SN 1987A. Yet, as bright as it is, the new eROSITA data shows that it is actually growing dimmer over time as the supernova's shockwave expands through the galaxy.
https://www.sciencealert.com/a-new-telescope-has-revealed-the-shockwave-from-a-1987-supernova
