Astronomers have recorded the largest cosmic explosion ever observed, presumably caused by a huge cloud of gas that was absorbed by a supermassive black hole, as reflected in observations published in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.
The explosive event, called AT2021lwx, is located at a distance of 8 billion light-years and turned out to be ten times brighter than any known supernova, which is the phenomenon that occurs when massive stars die. In addition, this explosion has been occurring for more than three years, making it the most energetic explosion ever recorded.
The phenomenon was first detected in 2020 by the Zwicky transient facility in California, which is designed to observe the night sky for various cosmic events.
Astronomer Philip Wiseman of the University of Southampton in the United Kingdom, who led the study, revealed that the explosion went unnoticed for a year as it grew brighter. The astronomers only realized they had captured an incredibly rare phenomenon when observations revealed its remoteness.
Wiseman explained that this is a fireball that is 100 times the size of the solar system and twice as bright as the Sun. In three years, this event has released approximately one hundred times more energy than the sun will release in its 10 billion-year lifetime.
Although there are other theories as to how the explosion occurred, astronomers currently favor the idea that a gigantic cloud of gas, possibly thousands of times larger than our sun, was ripped from its orbit around the black hole and pulled toward it.
However, AT2021lwx is not the brightest phenomenon ever observed. An even brighter explosion, known as GRB 221009A, was detected last year, although it only lasted a few minutes. The new event is still active, meaning that the total energy release is much larger.