"Hubble Finds a Mystery Object"

[kstar]

Weird.

Don't get the idea that we've found every kind of astronomical object there is in the universe. In a paper to appear in the Astrophysical Journal, astronomers working on the Supernova Cosmology Project report finding a new kind of something that they cannot make any sense of.

The project used the Hubble Space Telescope to monitor very distant galaxy clusters for supernovae. On February 21, 2006, in the direction of a far-away cluster in Bootes named CL 1432.5+3332.8 (redshift 1.112, light travel time 8.2 billion years), Hubble began seeing something brighten. It continued brightening for about 100 days and peaked at 21st magnitude in two near-infrared colors. It then faded away over a similar timescale, until nothing was left in view down to 26th magnitude. The object brightened and faded by a factor of at least 120, maybe more.

The mystery object did not behave like any known kind of supernova. It is not even in any detectable galaxy. "The shape of the light curve is inconsistent with microlensing," say the researchers. They recorded three spectra of it — and its spectrum, they write, "in addition to being inconsistent with all known supernova types, is not matched to any spectrum in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey database" of vast numbers of objects. "We suggest that the transient may be one of a new class."

What's its distance? That would certainly be a first step to figuring it out, but only the broadest constraints can be put on its distance. Its lack of parallax motion means that it can't be closer than about 130 light-years, and a lack of cosmic hydrogen absorption in its spectrum means that it can't be farther than 11 billion light-years (when "distance" is defined by light travel time). That leaves a lot of leeway.

Here is the group's paper with all the details. The lead author is Kyle Barbary (University of California at Berkeley).

Any ideas? Put 'em in the comments below! (Please read the paper first, and post ideas that fit the observations.)

Source: http://www.skyandtelescope.com/community/skyblog/newsblog/28244844.html?pageSize=0
Original paper (This is linked to a PDF!): http://arxiv.org/PS_cache/arxiv/pdf/0809/0809.1648v1.pdf

[trekkor]

I am happy you did not post a teapot as a joke...


KT

[kstar]

Originally Posted by trekkor

I am happy you did not post a teapot as a joke...


KT

The "object" is currently "unknown".

[trekkor]

Ahhh, yes. oh course...


is, was and always will be?


KT

[Jim Richards]

Someone broke the holy teapot?

Cool article, Kurt. I love to read about all these weird unexplained phenomena.

[M.D. Holloway]

the Borg

[trekkor]

LHC created a black hole?


KT

[M.D. Holloway]

more like the LDS!

[svandamme]

it's like that movie, the final countdown !!
can't wait to go back in time!

[Pazuzu]

Lots of strange things that are postulated but never seen, because the time scale is too small. for example, does a Red Giant puff off it's planetary nebula quickly (over days/weeks/years) or does it take tens, hundreds of years? Does the core gas that is puffed off ever get sucked back onto the forming white dwarf?

What about merging black holes? They might have a continuum spectrum with some intervening absorption lines.

Industrial accident? Early on in the studies of Gamma Ray Bursts, that was an actual option that was seriously discussed, as was looking down the barrel of a fusion warp drive.

[dtw]

Superman's home planet blowing up. The lag on the light transmission seems reasonable.

[Pazuzu]

White dwarf encountering a sub-dwarf planet. It's a thermal event, not a nuclear one. Not an exploding star, not a pulsar. blackbody infers stellar temperatures. Lack of H-alpha would infer old progenitors (not small, hot new stars). Time frame could fit with a 10x Jupiter mass planet being accreted onto a white dwarf or neutron star. It's too bad it was so dim, they couldn't get any variability out of it (that would have been helpful). Also, x-ray and gamma ray data would have been good.

[kang]

Originally Posted by trekkor

Ahhh, yes. oh course...


is, was and always will be?


KT

Maybe. It's 130 light years away. That's a long, long ways. We might never learn what it is. Now, what does that mean? It just means that we can't collect enough data about it to learn what it is. Is that significant to you in any way? That we can't collect data about something that is 130 light years away?

[beepbeep]

Originally Posted by kang

Maybe. It's 130 light years away. That's a long, long ways. We might never learn what it is. Now, what does that mean? It just means that we can't collect enough data about it to learn what it is. Is that significant to you in any way? That we can't collect data about something that is 130 light years away?

Hmm...they say it's between 130ly and 11 billion ly... Quite a stretch.

[DARISC]

A minor cosmic blemish (astrotrash happens). Creator buffed it out (or put it back on the burner?).

[RWebb]

Those damn Aliens are trying to weird us out again.

switching their dang stars on & off agian, just to play with our minds!

I say we declare WAR on 'em!

[kstar]

You scientist folk should read the paper posted above as a PDF.

The "object's" spectra is not analogous to any previous "stellar" observations, according to the paper.

[dd74]

Originally Posted by RWebb

Those damn Aliens are trying to weird us out again.

switching their dang stars on & off agian, just to play with our minds!

I say we declare WAR on 'em!

Bring 'em on. I like meeting new and interesting people...ur...aliens...

[svandamme]

somebody built a bigger hardon collider

[DARISC]

Originally Posted by svandamme

somebody built a bigger hardon collider

Come again? That wood be exciting (but hard to believe), Are they excited about it at the Johnson Space Center? They're a pretty passionate bunch of scientists over there. You'd think that it certainly would get them pretty aroused!