Astronomers attempting from ages to explain the cause of the puzzling bursts of light in space have finally described the phenomenon as a new kind of exploding star. The mystery which spanned over a decade was finally solved with the help of NASA’s Kepler Space Telescope.
Astronomers had encountered a brief glimpse of this phenomenon in 2012 while reviewing data captured by Kepler. A 10% bump in light from a galaxy 1.3 billion light years away from earth was recorded by Kepler. Scientists were unable to conclude if the flash of light was from an exploding star or a computer glitch. Scientifically known as Fast Evolving Luminous Transients (FELTs), this phenomenon would occur and die down within a month making it hard for space telescopes to capture the event as they record data from a patch of space every few days. The FELT captured in 2015 developed over 2.2 days and faded within 10 days making the discovery of this phenomenon virtually undetectable.
The Kepler Spacecraft aims at exploring exoplanets by taking shots of a single stretch of galaxy for prolonged periods of time. Kepler detects faint changes in a star’s brightness through the transitory stages of planets around them. This calls for the recording of high precision and continuous data. During its mission, Kepler was able to capture the activity of a FELT in remarkable detail. Peter Garnavich, professor and department chair of astrophysics and cosmology physics at the University of Notre Dame and co-author of the study, described the event as “the most beautiful light curve we will ever get for a fast transient.”
Kepler telescope and K2 mission funded by NASA is expected to end in a few months due to fuel exhaustion. 20 more supernova examples have been extracted by Kepler for comprehensive study. Astrophysicists have applauded the contribution of Kepler in the analysis of cosmic phenomena and for propelling the further study of FELTs.