ASTRONOMERS have been left baffled by what appears to be the biggest explosion ever recorded in space.
They have no idea where or what it came from.
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It was more than 10 times brighter than any known supernova and three times brighter than the brightest tidal disruption event, where a star falls into a supermassive black hole.
The blast, known as AT2021lwx, has been going on for more than three years, and is brighter than almost anything ever seen, according to scientists at the University of Southampton in the UK.
However, scientists reckon the explosion first took place when the universe was around six billion years old.
Astronomers have traced its location nearly 8billion years away.
Dr Philip Wiseman, research fellow at the University of Southampton, who led the research, said: “We came upon this by chance, as it was flagged by our search algorithm when we were searching for a type of supernova.
“Most supernovae and tidal disruption events only last for a couple of months before fading away.
“For something to be bright for two plus years was immediately very unusual.”
While they’re left with no concrete evidence as to what caused the eruption, scientists do have one idea.
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The most feasible explanation is that it may be a vast cloud of gas larger than our sun was torn apart by a supermassive black hole.
Although the violent path of a black hole has never sparked such a outburst, according to human records.
“With new facilities, like the Vera Rubin Observatory’s Legacy Survey of Space and Time, coming online in the next few years, we are hoping to discover more events like this and learn more about them,” Wiseman added.
“It could be that these events, although extremely rare, are so energetic that they are key processes to how the centres of galaxies change over time.”
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