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Scientists have found out how stars die in the universe.
Stars can be cut in half using "relativistic blades" - super-powerful plasma ejections formed by extremely strong magnetic fields, according to an unpublished study. These "blades" that slice through stars may explain some of the brightest explosions in the universe.
The study's authors, from the Center for Cosmology and Particle Physics at New York University, presented their results in a paper published in September on the preliminary arXiv database. The article hasn't been reviewed yet.
Scientists have been looking for the origin of certain types of gamma-ray bursts (GRBs). GRBs are some of the most powerful explosions in the sky, but they usually occur so far away that we only see them as a brief but intense excess of gamma radiation. Most astrophysicists believe that either black holes or magnetars can be used to generate the energy needed for GRBs, especially when they are involved in something violent, such as ripping apart a star.
In the new study, the authors suggest that these long GRBs may occur during the death of massive stars. The star's core contracts to form a neutron star, a ball of ultra-dense neutrons surrounded by heavy layers of hydrogen and helium. This neutron star can acquire an extremely strong magnetic field through rapid compression and rotation, turning into a magnetar-an object with the most powerful magnetic fields in the universe.
A newborn magnetar is surrounded by chaos. Its own gravitational pull draws the remaining atmosphere of the parent star towards it, but intense radiation and magnetic fields churn this plasma. The authors of the new study conclude that the magnetar's magnetic fields can also emit intense gusts of radiation along the magnetar's equator. Under the extreme centrifugal forces of the rotating star, these rays of radiation form a blade that moves through the star at almost the speed of light, and carries more energy than a supernova explosion.
Stars can be cut in half using "relativistic blades" - super-powerful plasma ejections formed by extremely strong magnetic fields, according to an unpublished study. These "blades" that slice through stars may explain some of the brightest explosions in the universe.
The study's authors, from the Center for Cosmology and Particle Physics at New York University, presented their results in a paper published in September on the preliminary arXiv database. The article hasn't been reviewed yet.
Scientists have been looking for the origin of certain types of gamma-ray bursts (GRBs). GRBs are some of the most powerful explosions in the sky, but they usually occur so far away that we only see them as a brief but intense excess of gamma radiation. Most astrophysicists believe that either black holes or magnetars can be used to generate the energy needed for GRBs, especially when they are involved in something violent, such as ripping apart a star.
In the new study, the authors suggest that these long GRBs may occur during the death of massive stars. The star's core contracts to form a neutron star, a ball of ultra-dense neutrons surrounded by heavy layers of hydrogen and helium. This neutron star can acquire an extremely strong magnetic field through rapid compression and rotation, turning into a magnetar-an object with the most powerful magnetic fields in the universe.
A newborn magnetar is surrounded by chaos. Its own gravitational pull draws the remaining atmosphere of the parent star towards it, but intense radiation and magnetic fields churn this plasma. The authors of the new study conclude that the magnetar's magnetic fields can also emit intense gusts of radiation along the magnetar's equator. Under the extreme centrifugal forces of the rotating star, these rays of radiation form a blade that moves through the star at almost the speed of light, and carries more energy than a supernova explosion.
