On the night of January 21, 2014, a group of astronomy students at University College London fortuitously spotted a supernova in M82
, the famous nearby irregular galaxy in Ursa Major. The students were schedueled to learn how to use a C14 and CCD imager, however as clouds threatened to curtail procedings an image of the M82 galaxy was quickly taken, and wouldn't you just know it a supernova was visible within the structure of the galaxy.
The Supernova 2014J is a type 1a event-that is to say a white dwarf detonation. These can occur when the white dwarf - the core of an already defunct stellar mass star after it has evolved through the planetary nebula phase, is overloaded by material pulled off a nearby red giant star. Once a critical mass is reached (1.44 solar masses) the white dwarf goes bang and totally anihilates itself.
Currently as of Feb 11th the supernova is mag 10.7 and should be visible in a small telescope or even decent binoculars. M82, which lies 11-12 million light years distant is one of the pair of galaxies in Ursa Major, which during evenings at this time of year resides high up to the northeast.
Image: M82 galaxy - before and after
Image Credit: UCL/University of London Observatory/Steve Fossey/Ben Cooke/Guy Pollack/Matthew Wilde/Thomas Wright
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