The breakdown of matter into its tiniest quark components in a star's core may have triggered the brightest supernova ever seen. If correct, this would be the first time anyone has seen the birth of an exotic object called a quark star.On 18 September 2006, astronomers observed the record-breaking supernova, called 2006gy, and were shocked to find that it was intrinsically about 100 times brighter than typical stellar explosions.
To explain its extreme power, its discoverers invoked an unusual argument based on the creation of pairings of matter and antimatter particles inside a massive star. Some physicists say that when matter is crushed to extreme densities, it settles into a soup of individual quarks. A cubic centimetre of this new type of matter – dubbed 'strange’ would weigh as much as a billion tonnes and would have the unusual property of converting any ordinary matter that touches it into more strange matter, releasing energy in the process.
The energy released by converting the core of a star into strange matter would cause an explosion called a quark nova, observed for the first time in SN 2006gy. the event begins when a massive star blasts away its outer layers in an ordinary supernova explosion. In the process, the star's core collapses to become a dense object called a neutron star. some neutron stars last only a short time because their magnetic properties cause their spin rates to drastically slow down. Because centrifugal force can no longer support the neutron star's core, it collapses even further, transforming into strange matter.The transformation releases a tremendous amount of energy, blasting the neutron star's outer layers into space at close to light speed. The layers then slam into debris from the original supernova, creating an intense glow bright enough to explain the observations of SN 2006gy.
"Strange matter may exist or it may not, It's not proven theoretically – it's an open issue.” Evidence for the quark nova scenario could come from continued monitoring of the aftermath of SN 2006gy, which could show signs of rare elements with an atomic weight greater than 130.
To explain its extreme power, its discoverers invoked an unusual argument based on the creation of pairings of matter and antimatter particles inside a massive star. Some physicists say that when matter is crushed to extreme densities, it settles into a soup of individual quarks. A cubic centimetre of this new type of matter – dubbed 'strange’ would weigh as much as a billion tonnes and would have the unusual property of converting any ordinary matter that touches it into more strange matter, releasing energy in the process.
The energy released by converting the core of a star into strange matter would cause an explosion called a quark nova, observed for the first time in SN 2006gy. the event begins when a massive star blasts away its outer layers in an ordinary supernova explosion. In the process, the star's core collapses to become a dense object called a neutron star. some neutron stars last only a short time because their magnetic properties cause their spin rates to drastically slow down. Because centrifugal force can no longer support the neutron star's core, it collapses even further, transforming into strange matter.The transformation releases a tremendous amount of energy, blasting the neutron star's outer layers into space at close to light speed. The layers then slam into debris from the original supernova, creating an intense glow bright enough to explain the observations of SN 2006gy.
"Strange matter may exist or it may not, It's not proven theoretically – it's an open issue.” Evidence for the quark nova scenario could come from continued monitoring of the aftermath of SN 2006gy, which could show signs of rare elements with an atomic weight greater than 130.
1 comment:
This is really am amazing news for me, the best in ur blog......Working in this field for so long, I was not all aware of this "strange matter"....obviously its not the so called "strange quarks" which have strangeness quatum number -1. This is "strange " in some other sense.....So now people will have to study the effect of quark degeneracy pressure, but this will again be a very complicated problem for the theoriticians because handling the quark interactions in a collective way is not well understood, even not at the scale of mesons......it will be a very interesting and challenging problem for us.....may be u can slove it after few years......
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