A new type of supernova?

This one exploding star outshines an entire galaxy! The NGC 1260 core is the dimmer object.

Ok, I thought I was all on the up and up with these things and how they worked.  Ok, that is, as much as a layman can be on the up and up.  I am not an astrophysicist (yet)!

So get this: a few years ago we witnessed a strange supernova.  Actually, a little back story first.  The general idea I always had was that stars with several solar masses went supernova.  Reason being, they burned through their fuel at a greater rate.  Once the fuel at the core was gone or fusion wasn’t adequate enough to resist the inward pressure (gravity) the whole thing collapsed.  This releases a tremendous amount of energy and essentially the star explodes.  You get left with a huge amount of ‘stuff’ being blown out into space and you’re left with either a neutron star or black hole at what used to be the core of the star.

That was a super basic overview and back story.  So what is this new supernova?  It is being called a Pair-instability Supernova.  What the what?!  If the name sounds bizarre then wait until you hear about how it works.

So here is how it goes.  First, you need a supermassive star.  A star of 130-250 solar masses seems to be the “zone”.  Instinctively, one thinks “the more massive the star, the more massive the black hole it leaves behind”.  Well, not really.  At least, not in the case of this kind of star.  See, these supermassive stars have low metallicity.  I believe that means they’re almost entirely Hydrogen and Helium with very little other elements present…

…and well, I’m going to just post what Wiki says because I’m feeling lazy:

A pair instability supernova occurs when pair production, the production of free electrons and positrons in the collision between atomic nuclei and energetic gamma rays, reduces thermal pressure inside a supermassive star‘s core. This pressure drop leads to a partial collapse, then greatly accelerated burning in a runaway thermonuclear explosion which blows the star completely apart without leaving a black hole remnant behind.^[1][2] Pair instability supernovae can only happen in stars with a mass range from around 130 to 250 solar masses and low to moderate metallicity (low abundance of elements other than hydrogen and helium, a situation common in Population III stars). The recently observed objects SN 2006gy and SN 2007bi^[3] are hypothesized to have been pair instability supernovae.

So there, you have it.  The star goes kablooey and leaves nothing but the fresh scent of brute.  Ok maybe not.  Incredible though, that a star can completely obliterate itself and leave nothing behind.

With that said, the star SN 2006gy is in a galaxy some 240 million light  years away (ie the light we saw originated 240 million years ago).  There is a star nearer to us, Eta Carinae that might go supernova much in the same way.  If it does, it will likely be brilliantly bright.  Visible during the day and able to be read by at night.

Fact is stranger than fiction, once again.

More info here

And here (this site has multiple links at the bottom)

Am I weird?

I hate 90% of what is on TV.  Maybe I don’t hate it, but I don’t want to be bothered with it.  I don’t watch anything current really.  I’ve never seen one episode of Lost, House and I’m sure there are a lot more that I can’t think of.  The only show I’ve actually followed in the past decade was Doctor Who.   Meaning, the only show with an actual plot-line.

Now, I’ve followed documentaries-a-plenty.  I can’t speak for everyone but I’d venture to say not as many people eagerly await the revamped version of Carl Sagan’s Cosmos.

Right now there are a handful of shows I like.  Deadliest Catch is one of them.  It’s fascinating to watch these guys do what they do.  The latest show I started watching, last night, was Pitchmen.  Call me a lunatic but I find that industry rather interesting.  If you haven’t heard about it, it’s got Billy Mays (yes, the Oxyclean guy) and Anthony Sullivan in it.   They take a couple of products, pitch them and see what sticks.  I suppose it’s my creative/inventive mind that sort of evaluates the products and so forth.   So I find interest and entertainment value there.  Plus it’s nice to see Billy Mays actually talk and not yell.

And that takes me to my shows of preference.  I like watching how things are made.  I like watching things explode.  Real explosions, not Hollywood ones.  I like watching tornadoes, again, the real ones.  I like watching nearly anything on science.  I draw the line at biology, never really liked biology!  I like watching Time Warp, the show that slows things down to insane slow motion.  I like watching rockets, again with the explosions, but controlled explosions.  Mythbusters is a great show.  How it’s made is a great show.  Dirty Jobs is a great show.   I suppose it’s “real” reality TV that I like.  I don’t really like the pretentiousness of most reality TV.  Pitchmen is semi-reality I guess but it’s tolerable.

I don’t care who gets voted off an island.  I don’t care who can sing, honestly.  I suppose it’s because those things don’t really directly affect me?  Am I a non-tv elitist?  I guess so!  Nah, a non-everyone else watches it-tv elitist!

I’ve always been that way.  I didn’t like Weezer until about five years AFTER their blue album.  I don’t like bandwagons I guess.  I don’t like fads much either.  I stopped liking fads after the whole color changing shirts craze of the 80s.

I prefer timeless things, with a few exceptions of course.  This is just a semi rant because I get tired of being asked if I watched this or that.  Half of the news online seems to be which Idol got bumped off or who left what show.  The other half is depressing as all hell.  Doesn’t leave much for good stuff, to me.  So I make my own!

But wait, there’s more!

Actually, not really.  That’s it my rant on TV is done.  Now, my next rant: Facebook and other online perils.