![]() First image: Messier 82 on 10 December 2013. Second image: The same view on 22 January 2014. The position of the supernova is marked. | |
Event type | Supernova ![]() |
---|---|
SN.Ia ![]() | |
Right ascension | 9h 55m 42.217s [1] |
Declination | 69° 40′ 26.56″ [1] |
Epoch | J2000 |
Distance | 11,500,000 ly (3,500,000 pc) |
Host | Messier 82 |
Progenitor | unknown |
Notable features | Closest Type Ia for 40 years |
Other designations | SN 2014J |
SN 2014J was a type-Ia supernova in Messier 82 (the 'Cigar Galaxy', M82) discovered in mid-January 2014. [2] It was the closest type-Ia supernova discovered for 42 years, and no subsequent supernova has been closer as of 2023 [update] . The supernova was discovered by chance during an undergraduate teaching session at the University of London Observatory. It peaked on 31 January 2014, reaching an apparent magnitude of 10.5. [3] SN 2014J was the subject of an intense observing campaign by professional astronomers and was bright enough to be seen by amateur astronomers.
The supernova was discovered by astronomer Steve Fossey, of University College London and four of his undergraduate students: Ben Cooke, Guy Pollack, Matthew Wilde and Thomas Wright. Fossey was training the students on how to use a small 0.35-metre (14 in) telescope at University of London Observatory, located in Mill Hill, a suburb of north London. [4] [5] [6]
The discovery was serendipitous, because Fossey was not searching for supernovae, had not planned to look at M82, and only wanted to take advantage of a short gap in the London cloud cover. He later said that "The weather was closing in, with increasing cloud, so instead of the planned practical astronomy class, I gave the students an introductory demonstration of how to use the CCD camera on one of the observatory’s automated 0.35–metre telescopes." [5]
At 19:20 GMT on 21 January 2014, Fossey and his students noticed a bright new star in their images of the galaxy Messier 82, also known as the Cigar Galaxy. [5] After comparing their image to archival ones of the same galaxy, they used observations with a second telescope to eliminate the possibility of an instrumental artefact. [6] Their discovery was reported to the International Astronomical Union's Central Bureau for Astronomical Telegrams, who confirmed that they were the first to spot the supernova and assigned it the name SN 2014J as the tenth supernova discovered in 2014. [5] Fossey and the four students were credited as joint discoverers. [7]
Follow-up adaptive optics observations with the 10-metre (390 in) Keck telescope at Mauna Kea Observatory, Hawaii were used to precisely determine the location of the new supernova. [1] The first optical spectrum was obtained using the 3.5-metre (140 in) ARC telescope in New Mexico, which showed the supernova to be of Type Ia. [9] Pre-discovery recovery images were found that showed the supernova as early as 15 January, six days before discovery. [10]
Early indications were that the supernova had been discovered approximately 14 days before maximum light, so it would get brighter over the following fortnight. [9] It was predicted to be bright enough to be visible with binoculars throughout the Northern Hemisphere. [4] The supernova continued to get brighter until 31 January, when it peaked at an apparent magnitude of 10.5. [3]
SN 2014J was a popular target for amateur astronomers because it was located close to The Plough asterism (the 'Big Dipper') and visible all night for most Northern Hemisphere observers. [11] [12]
Its unusual brightness and relative closeness led to SN 2014J becoming the subject of intense follow-up observations by astronomers worldwide, [6] including with the Hubble Space Telescope. [13] Over 250 scientific papers have discussed the supernova. [14] [15]
Type Ia supernovae are especially important as standard candles in physical cosmology, and the relative closeness of SN2014J allowed astronomers to study the explosion in much more detail than is possible for most objects of this type. [6]
SN2014J was observed by the INTErnational Gamma-Ray Astrophysics Laboratory (INTEGRAL) which detected the gamma-ray spectral lines characteristic of the radioactive decay chain 56Ni→56Co→56Fe. [16] This was the first time these lines were detected in a Type Ia supernova,[ citation needed ] providing support for the standard model that this class of supernova produces large quantities of 56Ni through nucleosynthesis. [17]
Observations of the diffuse interstellar bands in the spectrum of the supernova indicated that it lay behind a significant quantity of interstellar medium in M82. The supernova therefore suffered from interstellar extinction, with a reddening of at least one magnitude. [18] The degree of light extinction from M82 dust blocking SN 2014J reduces its value as an observational prototype for Type Ia supernovae, but makes it a powerful probe of the interstellar medium of M82. [19]
Researchers used archival images from the Hubble Space Telescope to study the environment of SN 2014J prior to the supernova, hoping to identify the progenitor system, [20] but found no identifiable progenitor star. [21] This is not unexpected, because the progenitors of type Ia supernovae are thought to be white dwarfs in binary systems, [22] and observation of SN 2014J provided empirical confirmation for this. [23] The white dwarf is much too faint to detect at the distance of M82, but its companion would have been detectable if it had been a bright evolved giant star. It will however remain too faint if it is a second white dwarf (the double degenerate Type Ia supernova path), a lower main-sequence star, or even a giant star on the fainter part of the giant sequence.
At a distance of 11.5 ± 0.8 million light-years (3.5 ± 0.3 megaparsecs), [24] SN 2014J was one of the closest supernovae seen for decades. It was the closest type Ia supernova since SN 1972E, [11] and the closest supernova of any type since 2004. Some sources initially stated that SN 2014J was the closest supernova of any type since SN 1987A, [4] but this claim is erroneous. [11] The last supernova that was unambiguously closer to Earth than SN 2014J was SN 2004dj, a type II-P supernova in the galaxy NGC 2403, 8 million light-years from Earth. SN 1993J was a type IIb supernova at almost the same distance as SN 2014J, because it was located in Messier 81, which together with Messier 82 and NGC 3077 forms the core of the M81 group of galaxies. [5]
SN 1604, also known as Kepler's Supernova, Kepler's Nova or Kepler's Star, was a Type Ia supernova that occurred in the Milky Way, in the constellation Ophiuchus. Appearing in 1604, it is the most recent supernova in the Milky Way galaxy to have been unquestionably observed by the naked eye, occurring no farther than 6 kiloparsecs from Earth. Before the adoption of the current naming system for supernovae, it was named for Johannes Kepler, the German astronomer who described it in De Stella Nova.
Messier 82 (also known as NGC 3034, Cigar Galaxy or M82) is a starburst galaxy approximately 12 million light-years away in the constellation Ursa Major. It is the second-largest member of the M81 Group, with the D25 isophotal diameter of 12.52 kiloparsecs (40,800 light-years). It is about five times more luminous than the Milky Way and its central region is about one hundred times more luminous. The starburst activity is thought to have been triggered by interaction with neighboring galaxy M81. As one of the closest starburst galaxies to Earth, M82 is the prototypical example of this galaxy type. SN 2014J, a type Ia supernova, was discovered in the galaxy on 21 January 2014. In 2014, in studying M82, scientists discovered the brightest pulsar yet known, designated M82 X-2.
The Pinwheel Galaxy is a face-on spiral galaxy 21 million light-years away from Earth in the constellation Ursa Major. It was discovered by Pierre Méchain in 1781 and was communicated that year to Charles Messier, who verified its position for inclusion in the Messier Catalogue as one of its final entries.
Centaurus A is a galaxy in the constellation of Centaurus. It was discovered in 1826 by Scottish astronomer James Dunlop from his home in Parramatta, in New South Wales, Australia. There is considerable debate in the literature regarding the galaxy's fundamental properties such as its Hubble type and distance. NGC 5128 is one of the closest radio galaxies to Earth, so its active galactic nucleus has been extensively studied by professional astronomers. The galaxy is also the fifth-brightest in the sky, making it an ideal amateur astronomy target. It is only visible from the southern hemisphere and low northern latitudes.
The Whirlpool Galaxy, also known as Messier 51a (M51a) or NGC 5194, is an interacting grand-design spiral galaxy with a Seyfert 2 active galactic nucleus. It lies in the constellation Canes Venatici, and was the first galaxy to be classified as a spiral galaxy. It is about 31 million light-years (9.5 Mpc) away from Earth and 76,900 ly (23,580 pc) in diameter.
Messier 81 (also known as NGC 3031 or Bode's Galaxy) is a grand design spiral galaxy about 12 million light-years away in the constellation Ursa Major. It has a D25 isophotal diameter of 29.44 kiloparsecs (96,000 light-years). Because of its relative proximity to the Milky Way galaxy, large size, and active galactic nucleus (which harbors a 70 million M☉ supermassive black hole), Messier 81 has been studied extensively by professional astronomers. The galaxy's large size and relatively high brightness also makes it a popular target for amateur astronomers. In late February 2022, astronomers reported that M81 may be the source of FRB 20200120E, a repeating fast radio burst.
SN 1885A was a supernova in the Andromeda Galaxy, the only one seen in that galaxy so far by astronomers. It was the first supernova ever seen outside the Milky Way, though it was not appreciated at the time how far away it was. It is also known as "Supernova 1885".
Messier 66 or M66, also known as NGC 3627, is an intermediate spiral galaxy in the southern, equatorial half of Leo. It was discovered by French astronomer Charles Messier on 1 March 1780, who described it as "very long and very faint". This galaxy is a member of a small group of galaxies that includes M65 and NGC 3628, known as the Leo Triplet or the M66 Group. M65 and M66 are a common object for amateur astronomic observation, being separated by only 20′.
Messier 74 is a large spiral galaxy in the equatorial constellation Pisces. It is about 32 million light-years away from Earth. The galaxy contains two clearly defined spiral arms and is therefore used as an archetypal example of a grand design spiral galaxy. The galaxy's low surface brightness makes it the most difficult Messier object for amateur astronomers to observe. Its relatively large angular size and the galaxy's face-on orientation make it an ideal object for professional astronomers who want to study spiral arm structure and spiral density waves. It is estimated that M74 hosts about 100 billion stars.
NGC 6946, sometimes referred to as the Fireworks Galaxy, is a face-on intermediate spiral galaxy with a small bright nucleus, whose location in the sky straddles the boundary between the northern constellations of Cepheus and Cygnus. Its distance from Earth is about 25.2 million light-years or 7.72 megaparsecs, similar to the distance of M101 in the constellation Ursa Major. Both were once considered to be part of the Local Group, but are now known to be among the dozen bright spiral galaxies near the Milky Way but beyond the confines of the Local Group. NGC 6946 lies within the Virgo Supercluster.
A Type Ia supernova is a type of supernova that occurs in binary systems in which one of the stars is a white dwarf. The other star can be anything from a giant star to an even smaller white dwarf.
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The known history of supernova observation goes back to 1006 CE. All earlier proposals for supernova observations are speculations with many alternatives.
NGC 4666 is a spiral galaxy in the equatorial constellation of Virgo, located at a distance of approximately 55 megalight-years from the Milky Way. It was discovered by the German-born astronomer William Herschel on February 22, 1784. It is a member of the Virgo II Groups, a series of galaxies and galaxy clusters strung out from the southern edge of the Virgo Supercluster. John L. E. Dreyer described it as "bright, very large, much extended 45°±, pretty suddenly brighter middle". It is a member of an interacting system with NGC 4668 and a dwarf galaxy, and belongs to a small group that also includes NGC 4632.
SN 2011dh was a supernova in the Whirlpool Galaxy (M51). It was discovered on 31 May 2011, with an apparent magnitude 13.5. and confirmed by several sources, including the Palomar Transient Factory. A candidate progenitor was detected in Hubble Space Telescope images. The progenitor may have been a highly luminous yellow supergiant with an initial mass of 18-24 solar masses. The supernova peaked near apparent magnitude 12.1 on 19 June 2011. Emission spectra indicated that the explosion was a type II supernova, in which a massive star collapses once nuclear fusion has ceased in its core.
SN 2011fe, initially designated PTF 11kly, was a Type Ia supernova discovered by the Palomar Transient Factory (PTF) survey on 24 August 2011 during an automated review of images of the Messier 101 from the nights of 22 and 23 August 2011. It was located in Messier 101, the Pinwheel Galaxy, 21 million light years from Earth. It was observed by the PTF survey very near the beginning of its supernova event, when it was approximately 1 million times too dim to be visible to the naked eye. It is the youngest type Ia ever discovered. About 13 September 2011, it reached its maximum brightness of apparent magnitude +9.9 which equals an absolute magnitude of about -19, equal to 2.5 billion Suns. At +10 apparent magnitude around 5 September, SN 2011fe was visible in small telescopes. As of 30 September the supernova was at +11 apparent magnitude in the early evening sky after sunset above the northwest horizon. It had dropped to +13.7 as of 26 November 2011.
SN 1895B was a supernova event in the irregular dwarf galaxy NGC 5253, positioned 16″ east and 23″ north of the galactic center. It is among the closest known extragalactic supernova events. The supernova was discovered by Williamina Fleming on December 12, 1895 after noticing an unusual spectrum on a photographic plate taken July 18, 1895, and was initially given the variable star designation Z Centauri. The light curve is consistent with an event that began ~15 days before the discovery plate was taken, and this indicates the supernova reached a peak visual magnitude of up to 8.49±0.03.
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SN 2020oi was a supernova event in the grand design spiral galaxy known as Messier 100, or NGC 4321. It was discovered January 7, 2020 at an apparent magnitude of 17.28 by F. Forster and associates using the Zwicky Transient Facility. The position places it ~4.67″ north of the galactic nucleus. The supernova was not detected on an observation made three days before the discovery, and thus it must have begun during that brief period. The light curve peaked around January 13–18, depending on the wavelength, then declined rapidly over a period of 25 days before flattening into a more gradual decline. Observations of the spectrum made with the SOAR telescope showed this to be a type Ic supernova, with the progenitor being a massive star that had its outer envelope stripped. The initial velocity of the expanding photosphere was ~15,000 km/s.
This is the closest type Ia supernova observed in the last 40 years.
the closest supernova to Earth that has been seen in decades
this is said to be the nearest supernova since 1972 of Type Ia