{"id":55896,"date":"2024-05-17T23:28:14","date_gmt":"2024-05-17T21:28:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/?p=55896"},"modified":"2024-05-19T18:51:30","modified_gmt":"2024-05-19T16:51:30","slug":"the-supernova-that-led-a-nasa-scientist-to-remember-a-spanish-painter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/2024\/05\/17\/the-supernova-that-led-a-nasa-scientist-to-remember-a-spanish-painter\/","title":{"rendered":"The supernova that led a NASA scientist to remember a Spanish painter"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sometimes, watching videos from the United States special agency on astronomy ends up giving you a surprise.<\/p>\n

NASA's virtual journey to the event horizon of a supermassive black hole<\/a><\/rel>
\nThe supermassive black hole of Phoenix A, the biggest known light-devouring monster<\/a><\/rel><\/p>\n

The famous physicist Albert Einstein (1879-1955) predicted the existence of gravitational lenses<\/strong>, which is how astronomers know the effect that a massive object, such as a galaxy, has on a beam of light. The existence of gravitational lenses was demonstrated in 1919<\/strong> thanks to a solar eclipse that occurred on May 29 of that year. Basically, what a gravitational lens causes is that from Earth we observe an object in a place in the universe where it really is not, since its light beam has been curved.<\/p>\n

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Einstein's Cross captured by the Hubble space telescope (Photo: NASA, ESA, STScI<\/a>).<\/div>\n

On April 24, 1990, NASA launched its Hubble space telescope into orbit<\/strong>, a powerful tool for observing and studying the universe. Five months after its launch, NASA made a fascinating discovery: four images of a quasar reached us through a gravitational lens<\/a>, called G2237+0305. The quasar appeared in four different positions, forming what NASA has named Q2237+030 or Einstein's Cross<\/strong> (on these lines), in the center of which is the galaxy ZW 2237+030 or Huchra Lens.<\/p>\n

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An image that explains the distortion of a beam of light due to gravitational lensing created by the galaxy ZW 2237+030 (Image: NASA, ESA<\/a>).<\/div>\n

This multiple gravitational lens was seen again in November 2014. Today NASA points out that the object whose light reaches us distorted is the Redsfal supernova<\/strong>, named in honor of the Norwegian astrophysicist Sjur Refsdal (1935-2009), who was the one who proposed the idea of capturing multiple images to capture these lenses and study the expansion of the universe.<\/p>\n

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An image showing how the Einstein Cross is formed (Image: NASA, ESA y D. Player STScI<\/a>).<\/div>\n

Einstein's Cross is visible in the galaxy cluster MACS J1149+2223<\/strong>, in which the blue supergiant star MACS J1149 Lensed Star 1 is located, which is the most distant star detected since Earth:<\/strong>is 14.4 billion light years away.<\/p>\n

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The galaxy cluster MACS J1149+2223 with the Redsfal supernova (zoomed in) in images captured by the Hubble Space Telescope in November 2014 (Photo: NASA\/ESA\/STScI\/UCLA<\/a>).<\/div>\n

This Friday, NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center has published a video in which Doctor Brian Welch explains what this Refsdal supernova is like and how its gravitational lens works<\/strong>. When I was watching the video, I heard Welch make the following comment: \"It almost looks like a bittle bit like a Salvador Dali painting of a galaxy<\/strong>\"<\/em>, a reference to this famous Spanish painter who made me laugh. You can watch the video here:<\/p>\n