ANDROMEDA / LONDON – A surprising discovery in archived NASA data has left astronomers stunned: a star in the Andromeda galaxy collapsed directly into a black hole without exploding as a supernova. This finding could fundamentally challenge existing models of stellar evolution.
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In a remarkable discovery, astronomers have observed the direct collapse of a star into a black hole within the Andromeda galaxy. The observation, made using data from a now-defunct NASA space telescope, presents a significant challenge to current understandings of how stars die. The star, known as M31-2014-DS1, showed increasing brightness in infrared light over several years before abruptly fading and disappearing without undergoing the typical supernova explosion.
The data leading to this discovery came from NASA’s Neowise mission, originally designed to search for near-Earth asteroids and comets. The telescope was decommissioned in 2024 and subsequently burned up in Earth’s atmosphere. A research team led by Kishalay De of Columbia University identified a striking infrared source in the archived data, indicating the star’s collapse. This type of direct collapse has been theoretically predicted for decades, but definitive observations have been lacking.
Star M31-2014-DS1 initially had roughly 13 times the mass of our Sun, but had shed much of its outer shell by the time of its demise, leaving it at around five solar masses. Astronomers generally assume stars of this size end as spectacular supernovae. The fact that no explosion apparently occurred challenges conventional models. Complex interactions between gravity, gas pressure, and shock waves inside the star may determine whether a star explodes or collapses silently.
A similar, though less well-documented, case was observed in the galaxy NGC 6946 in 2010. However, it is the newly analyzed finding in the Andromeda galaxy that provides sufficient data to study the process in greater detail. This discovery could have far-reaching implications for our understanding of stellar evolution and the formation of black holes. Scientists hope to learn more about the conditions that lead to direct collapse through further analysis and observation.
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