Hubble's Universe: A Flash Of Brilliance

[SGMDL]

@yipset1

We from earth aren't able to see this star, it's taken from Hubble in Space and it uses infrared wavelengths to see it (which are longer).

[TheLovesoul1]

its a me pizzario mambameya(000). lol

[penfoldbristol]

I would like to know how far away is this star?? I may have more quetions when i get a reply.

[yipset1]

I think im being stupid - but how are we able to view the expanding light when it has just travelled 2-5 light years from its source? surely it takes longer than that for any light from a star to reach us?

[MrFakunda]

Great vid. But.......its obvious what is going on here. It's a galaxy war.

[richmantck]

swallowing it's nearby planet or a super huge comet that got sucked in sounds more realistic.

[SuperUniverse555]

wow...

[Harold1305]

Of course it's easy to dismiss it as this but it could also be an interstellar beacon... maybe someone or something is just saying: "hello, is anybody out there?" although there is absolutely no evidence to back this hypothesis, a part of science is to keep all options open, how "ridiculous" they may be, until someone finds a fitting solution.

Tell us when you find out!

[tonybeir]

@Harold1305 it could be that. except thats a shity beacon. if aliens wanted to signal life they would figure out to make a beacon UNLIKE natural phenomena. say flash the beacon in a pattern. maybe even something that's universal that we would recognize say.

flash 3

flash 1

flash 4

flash 1

flash 5

flash 9

flash 2

then we'd go holy shit that star just flashed pi.

thar be aliens.

[Vennificus]

@tonybeir There are other more likely numbers to choose, maybe sequences

[Omniologia]

It's like sonar, but with light.

[DasMustafah]

Whoa.

[sorry8140]

informational

[dobberdoss]

could this not just be a star entering the end stage of it's life in one sudden step of expansion, like when your car runs out of gas? It's spurts and spatters before the final end result

[Saktoth]

@dobberdoss: I believe you are talking about a supernova. V838 mon was too small a star to undergo a supernova.

[dobberdoss]

right, whats your theory?

[Saktoth]

@dobberdoss:

Heaven forbid i should know more about it than the astrophysicists studying it!

Id suggest the wikipedia article on V838 mon.

[dobberdoss]

fantastic

[BoneySkylord]

Great video. Of course the simple answer to the question as to what is going on is "God did it". Perhaps NephilimFree could explain it for us.

[MakaveliatMoB]

way better presentation than the one ur "colleges" gave, they suck

[CarpeOmne]

Did anybody notice that V838 Mon looks very similar to the images that 2012 conspiracy nuts use as evidence that Niribu is on a collision course with Earth?

[defect530]

i know what that sudden flash is!!!

The beings living over there turned their LHC on before us. LOL

[camineca]

is very god . the universe is prety

[pronoob1983]

i gave u thumbs down because of 2 spelling mistakes. and 1 of them is worse than the other.

[1PercentRDA]

Incredible images! And great explanation!.

[mdiem]

Good point: If scientists already had all the answers then they'd be out of a job.

[totallyrandom02]

I really dont believe that a giant star gets "10 000" times brighter for a moment just if it swallows one of its big planets. 2 merging stars seem probable to me.

[makaisenki]

That sort of idea would be like tossing something flammable into a fire. The fire will get brighter.

They didn't talk about what kind of planet it is, because remember, not all planets are solids. I don't know what would happen if a star ate a gaseous planet or a solid one.

That's why it's being researched though. I'd like to see what star mergers look like, as well as planets of different substances look like so that we could get a reference point to go off of.

[jebus6kryst]

WOW!  This is an amazing video. I also like how scientists are not scared to so I dont know.

[carlosjhr64]

awsome!

[daFUNKxx]

That was Fascinating.

[pronoob1983]

I gave u a thumbs up because somebody put a thumbs down for your comment. It WAS Fascinating. and u spelled it right!!

[andreakset]

Got a question: (may be stupid) How can we see the light that traveled away from the star, when the light havent reached us yet?

[Khayd4126]

If it hadn't reached us yet, we couldn't see it. this happened at the location many, many years ago

[BlueStarFlower]

What we're seeing is the gas glowing in the light pulse - as the pulse moves through the cloud, the dust is illuminated and photons are scattered our way. Khayd4126 is right in that the actual event happened a long time ago - the light has only just reached us.

[anglicantian]

The light we observe now was emitted many years ago, V838 may not even exist anymore. We're seeing into the past by observing this light.

[makaisenki]

If only there was a way to obtain a view from light years further away so that we can look at that spot and see what happened there by looking at the light further in the past.

[andreakset]

Yeah I understand that we are seing an event that accured a long time ago. But in the video he explanes that we see the light as turning on and of a lightbulb and seing the light travel away from the star and in to the sourrounding gas. I just dont understand how we can observe the light that is travelig away from the star when it hasnt reached us yet. (hard to explain)

[psychosavant]

I understand what you're saying. I think you're confused about how this works. We're not seeing the light. We're seeing the objects that the light reflects off of. The light itself has already reached us which allows us to observe it. As it continues to move to our vicinity, it's taking the shape of whatever it reflected off of that specfic amount of time ago. You think we're observing light itself at that place over there. But that's not the case.

[andreakset]

Ok. That made me understand better:) Got a bit confused by the lightbulb scene. Wery interesting stuff... But complex:) Thanks a lot for a good answer!

[DasMustafah]

Thanks psycho, I had the exact same confusion and you explained it wonderfully. It's hard to remember how different you need to think when contemplating space.

[shoa31]

There is always something new out in space. Seeing the light travel 4 light years in four years on our scale is turly amazing!

[IAmDonar]

nerd porn, I love it

[DrInfidel]

I have my own hypothesis and explanation for this flash: "GOD DID IT!"

[gonyea12]

HOLY SHIT THAT IS COOL!

[danben72]

Brilliant, please more of it!

[niiidar]

Great, great video. Amazing photographs, never seen something like this before.

[mbturner625]

It's a beacon. Morse code.

[TrollN3m3s1s]

excellent!

[adamredwine]

Terrific video. Wonderful images. Thanks.

[tonybeir]

Great Stuff thank you so much.

[AtheistThatsATheist]

For all we know, all of the hypothesises are correct. And unless we observe these things before or during them happening, we'll never know what happened in any of these events

[NoAntecessor]

There are more methods of gathering evidence than just direct observation. To boldly declare "we'll never know" betrays your own ignorance of previous instances where we've established the past via other means than direct observation.

[AtheistThatsATheist]

Well yeah i agree. You may be able to observe the after effects, or consiquences of certain phenomenon but my point is that all of these hypothesis might be correct(or something not thought off yet)And that once the event has happened it may be too late to ever know.

[NoAntecessor]

I'm not trying to attack you here, I'm just strongly opposed to a defeatist stance when trying to unravel complex events in the universe. Men have come up with incredibly novel means of testing and confirming their hypothesis, so let's give them the benefit of a doubt while they work on it :).

[AtheistThatsATheist]

Lol its not a defeatist stance nor do i think youre attacking me. Its merely me saying they may be all right, and that maybe we have to be a little quicker to get our information. We can rewind the clock only so far before information is lost. Its not defeatist thats just life.

[NoAntecessor]

Well, considering that all the events we're observing at V838 happened 20,000 years ago (before the dawn of human civilization) I think we're doing pretty damn well :).

[AtheistThatsATheist]

Hence why i said we can only look so far back in time :P

The Crab Nebula is 6,500 years away so when we see it we're looking back that far. But in 1054 it was recorded by chinese and Arad astromeners. Now even though the observed light that was 6,500 years old, we'll never have the chance of seeing what they saw. That information has been lost for nearly 1000 years! See what i mean.

[NoAntecessor]

Ahh, but this also illustrates why I said you should give them a chance! You see, light doesn't just go in a straight line, it can also be reflected or bent. If we get creative enough it's altogether possible we can find a large appropriate reflector the proper distance from earth to examine this light again. Or, conversely, an unusual stellar object like a black hole would have a great enough gravitational pull near the event horizon to bend light back 180 degrees. Imagination! :)

[canerdc]

cOol

[jkand]

Interesting

[Keylimedelight]

Good vid

[Paxmax]

I love the mystery!

[jokingly]

Meh, what you saw was God xeroxing his butt, ya'll get the fax soon.

[FreeInquisition]

I fucking love the crab nebula.

[xIntoThePitx]

That was very interesting!

[Youanden]

I thought that there was dense space dust a couple million light years away from it parallel to our view of the star, or some obstruction, but idk. And I'm okay with that! No "God did it" here...

[Otokogoroshi]

That. Was. So. COOL!

[rationalargument]

Option nr4:

Aliens are using stars as a way to communicate.

Option nr5:

Aliens tested their nuclear fission missiles

Darn. xD

[logoth80]

so awesome

[sheepwshotguns]

great video! i like the idea of the star swallowing one of it's orbiting planets. we've spotted a lot of hot jupiters now, it would only make sense that a few would get sucked in from time to time.

[omegavalerius]

One of the best vids in a long time! I was almost grabbing my screen and shaking it shouting: "But what caused it!? what caused it?!"

[majav15mg]

It must require a lot of creativity in order to get a unicorn out of that pile of sticks, hahaha.

[evolsteveve]

Hmmm, God did it.

Or maybe aliens.

[HaleyMary]

Awesome video. How powerful a telescope would a person need in order to see a 15th magnitude star?

[coil311]

Thank you for this wonderful video :-)

[WhirlingWolves]

This is why I love science.

When a scienctist does'nt know they just say "We don't know".

And with that admission comes the possibility of discovery.

[lasthar18]

That is pretty cool. Space is interesting :D

[christo930]

So why don't we see the gas around stars that are always that bright? Is it because the light emitting from the star is bright enough to outshine the light it put out last week (creating a constant glare, as opposed to momentary brightness)?

What would happen if this happened to a star close to us or god forbid, the sun? Presumably we be toasted by the sun, but what about stars in our neighborhood?

[puncheex]

If you look at a good picture of the Pleides (the Seven Sisters) you'll see a blue haze between you and them. That's the same thing, but it is lit up continuously, not by a flash.

If the sun flashed 10,000 times brighter, we'd be toast. Planets around stars close by (say, within 5 light years) might get scorched.

[puncheex]

Search on the phrases "Larry Niven" and "Inconstant Moon" and read that story.

[christo930]

So we may be witnessing the death of a civilization... Reminds me of an Arthur C. Clarke short story where they go to check out a supernova and it turned out that there was a civilization there and they created a tomb on their pluto that survived and the crew was able to dig up.. Great story.

[ABONESR]

I really like this guy.

[Dehlila07]

that is pretty cool, a bubble of light expanding on the universe...I want an update in a few years

[SlimD11]

Wow, yet another mystery the cosmos throws at us. I miss Carl Sagan :(

[afs928]

The form to hide information is precisly in front of your nose..... like always!

[afs928]

Whats this "guy" said is simple stupid..... so you an see the start lighter constantly, but this Cloud is just light (one radiation wave of light) reflected into some king of cloud of dust? what you think? tht we are stupid? then why we may see a continuous brihgther star?

[puncheex]

This is really not too hard when you try: The star flashes. The flash travels on a straight line to us; therefore it is the first thing we see. Some of the light travels off to the side, lights up a gas cloud, and which then sends its light to us. It is later because it is taking a bent path to our eye; if it went 6 light-months out of it's way, we see it 6 months later than the flash.

See? We knew you could understand it when you dropped the attitude and really tried.

[CoolConejo]

Don't you guys wish we lived 1,000 years....just so we can experience all our species has to yet Discover?? even then, i believe we would be wanting to live another 100 years..I'm just glad i got the chance to exist, But kind if jealous of the coming generations, No flying car in your life times : (,,, lol

[Mattinmotion]

I think the same thing all the time. Torn between gratitude for living in these exciting times, and regret that I'll be missing the wonders still ahead.

[mattghtpa]

Thanks for the depressing thought.

[neothematrixhacker]

But isn't space a vacuum? Why would there be gas to be illuminated by the flash?

[PsyogiBottoms]

A vacuum is an absence of an atmosphere - i,e. sound has no medium in which to travel. However light travels through a vacuum illuminating everything it comes into contact. Just like a pool light underwater illuminates every object underwater.

[neothematrixhacker]

I know what a vacuum is, and that's what I'm saying. Space IS a vacuum, is it not? And even though light can in fact travel through space due to it's nature. But why is it illuminating gas that shouldn't be there?

[vg33k]

That's like asking: "If space is a vaccum, why are there rocks floating around Saturn?" Are you assuming that because space is a vaccum that it must be perfectly clear and clean of any gas/matter/etc? Odd assumption to make in my opinion...because space is actually quite "dirty". Lots of "stuff" just "floats" around, mostly around large masses (ie stars, planets, etc).

[neothematrixhacker]

Sorry for being so stubborn, but shouldn't the gas be dispersed until it's extremely thin?

[vg33k]

Well...with the whole mass/gravity thing taking effect...sometimes? I'd imagine that it would depend on how much gas there would be in order to build up enough mass to clump together...

[PsyogiBottoms]

no as a matter of fact gases tend to cling to each other in a weightless vacuum. Just think of it as like being on a huge trampoline with marbles everywhere (gas particles) the heaviest will start to draw in others until it is a Mass - then it will begin to spin (conservation of energy) and if dense enough ignite and become a star.

The universe is loaded with a shitload of dust and gases - everything is made out of it and returns to it. Get it?

[Mattinmotion]

PsyogiBottoms: I thought the universe WAS "thinning out" and that's why we see red shift; because stuff is still moving away from the Bang.

[PsyogiBottoms]

No...the Universe is Expanding - not thinning. As it expands the areas between increase, but there is still a tremendous amount of loose gas and dust floating around in huge (I mean OMFG Huge) clouds - that is what Nebulae are - they are just super gigantic dust and gas clouds with regions condensing into stars - star factories. Look up Horsehead, Eagle, or any of the popular nebulae and look at the picture - its all just illuminated dust and gas.

[carlandj]

Space is a "vacuum" in that it has no air pressure. However, air pressure exists due to gravity from earth. This is because air molecules have weight and try to push against each other. The combined force you feel from all directions is from this pushing. In the middle of space there is no gravity to create this effect. Space is a vacuum in that is has no pressure. But it still has particles of dust and gas floating throughout it. They just aren't being brought close enough to cause pressure.

[grits011]

I guess since the light echo is moving at the speed of light, we can make a pretty good estimate about exactly how far away this star is.

[puncheex]

Good thought. You have a very good parallax measurement there.

According to wiki, when they first saw it they thought it was 1900-2900 ly away. Later measurements indicate that it is 36,000 ly, pretty far while still being in the Milky Way. It has between 5 and 30 solar masses, and seems to be very young. It has a very young companion as well.

[vince19811981]

WOW! that is amazing, I want my own Hubble telescope, how much did it cost again?? 1.2 xillion dollars usd.

[PlantPirate]

I have a serious question, and I have no idea how to use Twitter. How fast must the light be traveling to reach us so we can see it? It must be traveling much faster than the light echo. I don't see how this is possible...

[puncheex]

Light always - ALWAYS - travels at 186,300 miles/sec, or 299,000 km/sec. The echo gets to us later because it travels a two part line, from the flash to the gas, and then from the gas to the telescope. That longer distance is why we see it later. If the additional distance is a light year, then we see that light one year later than the flash.

[PlantPirate]

"Light always - ALWAYS - travels at 186,300 miles/sec", Exactly, which is why I'm not sure why we see this at all, unless the light halo was approaching us, approaching us and had passed us. How did the light from this object get to us (so we can see it), while the light halo is only a few light years across. Sorry if there is an obvious answer... Do you understand my question?

[EvoTriumphsOverGod]

I understand. This flash of the star may have occured a very long time ago, all of this light takes around the same time to get to us, regardless if it is from the star, or is reflected off the gas surrounding the star. This light then is then viewed by us, many years later. Does that answer your question?

[PlantPirate]

Thanks Evo and Punch for answering. I guess I'm not stating my question clearly enough. Because the halo is made by light traveling through the gas, my understanding is that the only way we'd be able to see this halo is if we were in it. We wouldn't be able to see it so far away because light would have to actually speed UP to get to us so that we could see the light traveling through the gas, making the halo. Sorry I'm so rambly...

[Mattinmotion]

You're thinking of the light as an object, an expanding sphere. It's not. Think of it as a burst of countless rays. Some are going to hit gas particles early on and be reflected towards us. Some are going to go a bit further before they hit anything and so they'll take longer before they're reflected towards us and longer to travel here. Also, in a sense, the sphere you're thinking of has already passed us. That's how they noticed the increased brightness; the first rays of the sphere hit us!

[8WholeThing]

Let's say it happened a million light years away and a million years ago so the light arrived here in 2001. A year later, it illuminated the gas a light year away from it and it took a million years for that light to arrive here a year later. And so on.

[insanic1]

Aliens were fighting each other

[obiwankenobi28]

Great research of V838 Mon over lightened reaction, hmm could also have been amassive Asteroid impact or maybe a small planetoid?

[puncheex]

A massive asteroid impact on a star simply means the star swallows it up; there is no solid surface to impact. A whole planet being swallowed by a star might be enough to cause it to flare because of the sudden introduction of a huge load of hydrogen, which might undergo fusion under the right conditions, perhaps. Or there might be a neutron star companion, upon which any dumping would cause much fireworks. They just don't know yet.

[obiwankenobi28]

Hmm I wonder how long it can take to fuind something of such anomalies out heh, sending a probe towards it may seem like an idea but sometimes you wish you had the possibilies like they have in Star Trek like Warp Speed or from StarWars like Hyper Space and such, then just go there and find it all out heh.

[BespokeGroupUK]

beautiful

[EvieGurl6]

Well said! Great vid

[kaxitaksi]

God turned on his flashlite to get a sneakpeek on how his creation is goin?? Have some faith, thats all it takes ;))

[NuLLx42]

Whats that? God created billions apon billions of stars planets, galaxies and stars, all for us? buuuuuullllllsssshhhhiiiiitttt­t.....

[kaxitaksi]

Uhh.. hint: SATIRE!!

[vince19811981]

leave your dumb religion and fantasies of sky daddy out of science vid, no seriously, the god creation is getting old, so more to the point, fuck off you imbecile!!

[kaxitaksi]

Are u stupid or what? it was SATIRE!!!!! How the fuk did u even miss that??

[vince19811981]

oops, sorry dude!!

[kaxitaksi]

sry myself, did'nt mean to be so harsh... ;)

[NuLLx42]

haha, seriously tho, with all the like comments on youtube, its hard NOT to take it seriously. I just get sick of seeing comments about god in things that have absolutely nothing to do with it.

[Choowbz]

A collision with a gas giant is probably the closest explanation

But such equal radiance is hard to explain

Perhaps a collision then reaction?

Stellar indigestion?

[superdau]

@Choowbz

The equal radiance wouldn't be so hard to explain. A planet wouldn't just plummet into the star. It still has an orbit. Angular momentum has to be conserved until friction within the gas takes over, so it gets faster. There are planets larger than jupiter zipping around their star in less than 10 days! When reaching a distance where the gases of the objects touch, the planet will be ripped apart and maybe form a ring of gas. The ring would then fall into the star and make a flash.

[anselmo666666]

Amazing video, great job. 5 stars.

[1RadicalOne]

I remember V838...that one is a very interesting image...I've seen it called the "globe nebula", probably erroneously.

[puncheex]

The name nebula is general enough to cover. This phenomena will die away in another 20 years or so, as the echo grows dimmer. Nebula has covered everything from nova and supernova explosion debris to star birth clouds to gas cloud reflection/refraction to galaxies; it won't have to be stretched very far to accommodate this.

[prodigyat9]

Incredible!

[MrLeedsman]

How did we see the light flash before we seen the echo?

[scragar]

The light flash travels in a straight line, the echo travels in a different direction, then reflects back, this causes a time delay since the light travels further.

[TheReasonWhyGuy]

@MrLeedsman

The same way that a straight line, is a smaller distance than a bent one.

|

|

vs

\

/

The bending angle is the refraction point.

[puncheex]

Just as scrager says: the flash traveled the minimum distance, directly from the star to the telescope. The echo travels to the part of the dust it lights, and from there to the scope. If it went a half light year out of it's way (off the direct path), we see it 6 months after the flash and off to one side.

The echo is quite complex. 6 months after the flash we see the gas 1/4 light year behind it, 1/2 a ly to the side, and gas further away from the flash that is close to the direct path.

[MrLeedsman]

Thanks. You explained it well.

[Sanngot]

Aw... I was thinking it was a nova... oh well...

[7hkey]

thanx so mutch for that, the "pretty pictures" are

even more amazing when you know what's going on 8-)

[luckystrke]

Very very good video! Love this guy,. thx

[puncheex]

Yes. Very good use of the flatscreen out front rather than behind; I'll have to keep that in mind.

[HairyGamer]

cool, my moneys on the star swallowing one of its planets

[wafflethug]

I wouldn't be surprised if the originators of constellations were licking poisonous toads or eating magic mushrooms. There's no way any sober person would see 8 stars and say it resembled a unicorn

[puncheex]

If you had nothing better to do than to lay out in a field to make sure a wolf didn't gobble up your Christmas feast, you too would be seeing things in the sky. Familiar things (to them). "That's a Whopperburger, over there, and that there's the arm of Roger Clemente, and that's Michael Jackson's nose...".

[Cellsplitter]

Pretty pictures :)

[smashbeans]

awsome ty