On Oct. 9, an unbelievably powerful influx of X-rays and gamma rays infiltrated our solar system. It was likely the result of a massive explosion that happened 2.4 billion light-years away from Earth — and it’s left the science community stunned.
In the wake of the explosion, astrophysicists worldwide turned their telescopes toward the spectacular show, watching it unfold from a variety of cosmic vantage points. And as they vigilantly studied the event’s glimmering afterglow over the following week, they grew shocked by how utterly bright this gamma-ray burst seems to have been.
Eventually, the spectacle’s sheer intensity earned it a fitting (very millennial) name to accompany its robotic title of GRB221009A: B.O.A.T. — the “brightest of all time.”
“This GRB is an extraordinarily rare event,” Jillian Rastinejad, an astronomer at Northwestern University, said in a statement. “It was so bright that it triggered the Swift gamma-ray telescopes twice and fully saturated the detectors — something I haven’t seen in my time observing GRBs.”
So, what could be the root of this record-breaking eruption? Well, scientists reasoned, perhaps something just as mind-bendingly extreme.
As of now, the leading hypothesis is this GRB was generated by the death of an ancient star as it transformed into a monstrous black hole.
Highlighted is a speck of light signifying where GRB221009A came from.
International Gemini Observatory/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/B. O’Connor/J. Rastinejad/W. Fong/T.A. Rector/J. Miller/M. Zamani/D. de Martin
The idea here is that a huge supernova in the distant universe might have spurred the birth of a black hole, and as black holes are known to spew supreme particle-jets traveling at nearly the speed of light, maybe this one’s jet spit its contents toward Earth.
Perhaps Oct. 9 was the day we received evidence of the budding abyss.
An artist’s illustration of what the 2.4 billion-light-year-away jet may look like if we could stand right in front of it.
NASA/Swift/Cruz deWilde
A ‘once-in-a-century’ opportunity
“We think this is a once-in-a-century opportunity to address some of the most fundamental questions regarding these explosions, from the formation of black holes to tests of dark matter models,” Brendan O’Connor, an astrophysicist at the University of Maryland who helped initially observe the GRB, said in a statement.
Plus, if the burst really is connected to the genesis of an abyss like scientists imagine, it could provide us with valuable insight about how matter behaves while traveling near the speed of light, how stars collapse into unimaginably dense voids, and in a broader sense, what the conditions might be like in a galaxy other than our own — the distant realm where B.O.A.T. was born.
Swift’s X-Ray Telescope captured the afterglow of GRB 221009A about an hour after it was first detected. The bright rings form as a result of X-rays scattered from otherwise unobservable dust layers within our galaxy that lie in the direction of the burst.
NASA/Swift/A. Beardmore (University of Leicester)
However, it’s worth mentioning that everyone involved with researching this GRB is being super careful before making a final declaration of cause. Teams are still observing the event’s “afterglow,” in order to pinpoint whether the dead star; black hole theory stands strong.
“Given that most other long GRBs result from a massive star collapsing, we have every reason to believe that we will find direct evidence of a supernova,” Rastinejad said. “But that will take more work and time to confirm, and the universe could always surprise us.”
GRBs can also be associated with other cosmic marvels. As an example, shorter ones, which last mere fractions of a second, tend to stem from neutron star collisions — the crash of stellar bodies so dense a tablespoon of one is equal to something like the weight of Mount Everest.
On the bright side, though, because this GRB is so bright and in its infancy, scientists expect to be able to monitor it for several months. After one month, Rastinejad expects evidence of the event to disappear behind the sun, but once it comes back out early next year, says “we will be excited to see the GRB as a messy ‘toddler.’ Then, we will be ready and waiting to capture it on camera.”
All eyes are on B.O.A.T.
“The record-breaking nature of this GRB has reinvigorated the larger observational community in a big way,” Rasinejad said. “Everyone — even those who don’t typically study GRBs — has tried to point their detectors at it. It is a beautiful and surreal thing to be a part of and to watch how this story unfolds.”
On one hand, NASA instruments on the International Space Station like the NICER X-Ray Telescope and a Japanese detector dubbed the Orbiting High-energy Monitor Alert Network are involved. Then you have two independent teams, one led by Rastinejad and the other by O’Connor, utilizing the ground-based Gemini South telescope in Chile. And that just scratches the surface of who’s staring at the electrifying burst.
With all eyes on B.O.A.T, even if it turns out to be true that this ultra-bright GRB is the product of a star’s collapse, there’d remain far more to learn from it. We’d have the “how,” but some researchers are especially interested in understanding why the collapse would have spurred an event with this level of energy.
Although explosive GRB eruptions are captured a couple times per week, Wen-fai Fong, an astrophysicist at Northwestern University, emphasizes that “as long as we have been able to detect GRBs, there is no question that this GRB is the brightest that we have ever witnessed by a factor of 10 or more.”
It’s also curious that such high-energy rays could survive a 2.4 billion year-long journey to our planet in the first place. As the National Science Foundation’s NOIRLab puts it, scientists are wondering how particles emitted by the burst could “defy our standard understanding of physics.”
To get to the bottom of all this, it’s promising that scientists believe this burst is much closer to Earth than your average GRB. This means we can glean lots of details from it that otherwise might be too faint to see.
And even though such proximity may also partially explain why it appears so luminescent to us, “it’s also among the most energetic and luminous bursts ever seen regardless of distance, making it doubly exciting,” Roberta Pillera, the astrophysicist at the Polytechnic University of Bari, Italy, who led initial communications about the burst, said in a statement.
As NASA simply summarized, “another GRB this bright may not appear for decades.”
NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — The body of Ugandan Olympic athlete Rebecca Cheptegei — who died after being set on fire by her partner in Kenya — was received Friday by family and anti-femicide crusaders, ahead of her burial a day later.
Cheptegei’s family met with dozens of activists Friday who had marched to the Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital’s morgue in the western city of Eldoret while chanting anti-femicide slogans.
She is the fourth female athlete to have been killed by her partner in Kenya in yet another case of gender-based violence in recent years.
Viola Cheptoo, the founder of Tirop Angels – an organization that was formed in honor of athlete Agnes Tirop, who was stabbed to death in 2021, said stakeholders need to ensure this is the last death of an athlete due to gender-based violence.
“We are here to say that enough is enough, we are tired of burying our sisters due to GBV,” she said.
It was a somber mood at the morgue as athletes and family members viewed Cheptegei’s body which sustained 80% of burns after she was doused with gasoline by her partner Dickson Ndiema. Ndiema sustained 30% burns on his body and later succumbed.
Ndiema and Cheptegei were said to have quarreled over a piece of land that the athlete bought in Kenya, according to a report filed by the local chief.
Cheptegei competed in the women’s marathon at the Paris Olympics less than a month before the attack. She finished in 44th place.
Cheptegei’s father, Joseph, said that the body will make a brief stop at their home in the Endebess area before proceeding to Bukwo in eastern Uganda for a night vigil and burial on Saturday.
“We are in the final part of giving my daughter the last respect,” a visibly distraught Joseph said.
He told reporters last week that Ndiema was stalking and threatening Cheptegei and the family had informed police.
Four in 10 women or an estimated 41% of dating or married Kenyan women have experienced physical or sexual violence perpetrated by their current or most recent partner, according to the Kenya Demographic and Health Survey 2022.
TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — A rare Bronze-Era jar accidentally smashed by a 4-year-old visiting a museum was back on display Wednesday after restoration experts were able to carefully piece the artifact back together.
Last month, a family from northern Israel was visiting the museum when their youngest son tipped over the jar, which smashed into pieces.
Alex Geller, the boy’s father, said his son — the youngest of three — is exceptionally curious, and that the moment he heard the crash, “please let that not be my child” was the first thought that raced through his head.
The jar has been on display at the Hecht Museum in Haifa for 35 years. It was one of the only containers of its size and from that period still complete when it was discovered.
The Bronze Age jar is one of many artifacts exhibited out in the open, part of the Hecht Museum’s vision of letting visitors explore history without glass barriers, said Inbal Rivlin, the director of the museum, which is associated with Haifa University in northern Israel.
It was likely used to hold wine or oil, and dates back to between 2200 and 1500 B.C.
Rivlin and the museum decided to turn the moment, which captured international attention, into a teaching moment, inviting the Geller family back for a special visit and hands-on activity to illustrate the restoration process.
Rivlin added that the incident provided a welcome distraction from the ongoing war in Gaza. “Well, he’s just a kid. So I think that somehow it touches the heart of the people in Israel and around the world,“ said Rivlin.
Roee Shafir, a restoration expert at the museum, said the repairs would be fairly simple, as the pieces were from a single, complete jar. Archaeologists often face the more daunting task of sifting through piles of shards from multiple objects and trying to piece them together.
Experts used 3D technology, hi-resolution videos, and special glue to painstakingly reconstruct the large jar.
Less than two weeks after it broke, the jar went back on display at the museum. The gluing process left small hairline cracks, and a few pieces are missing, but the jar’s impressive size remains.
The only noticeable difference in the exhibit was a new sign reading “please don’t touch.”
VICTORIA – The British Columbia government is partnering with a bear welfare group to reduce the number of bears being euthanized in the province.
Nicholas Scapillati, executive director of Grizzly Bear Foundation, said Monday that it comes after months-long discussions with the province on how to protect bears, with the goal to give the animals a “better and second chance at life in the wild.”
Scapillati said what’s exciting about the project is that the government is open to working with outside experts and the public.
“So, they’ll be working through Indigenous knowledge and scientific understanding, bringing in the latest techniques and training expertise from leading experts,” he said in an interview.
B.C. government data show conservation officers destroyed 603 black bears and 23 grizzly bears in 2023, while 154 black bears were killed by officers in the first six months of this year.
Scapillati said the group will publish a report with recommendations by next spring, while an independent oversight committee will be set up to review all bear encounters with conservation officers to provide advice to the government.
Environment Minister George Heyman said in a statement that they are looking for new ways to ensure conservation officers “have the trust of the communities they serve,” and the panel will make recommendations to enhance officer training and improve policies.
Lesley Fox, with the wildlife protection group The Fur-Bearers, said they’ve been calling for such a committee for decades.
“This move demonstrates the government is listening,” said Fox. “I suspect, because of the impending election, their listening skills are potentially a little sharper than they normally are.”
Fox said the partnership came from “a place of long frustration” as provincial conservation officers kill more than 500 black bears every year on average, and the public is “no longer tolerating this kind of approach.”
“I think that the conservation officer service and the B.C. government are aware they need to change, and certainly the public has been asking for it,” said Fox.
Fox said there’s a lot of optimism about the new partnership, but, as with any government, there will likely be a lot of red tape to get through.
“I think speed is going to be important, whether or not the committee has the ability to make change and make change relatively quickly without having to study an issue to death, ” said Fox.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 9, 2024.
