When I was a little girl my daddy sat me on his lap as we sat outside on the porch pointing at what I thought was a normal star. My daddy said “next time you see this star you’ll probably be holding your grand baby in your arms“. “daddy what’s a grand baby”? “ it’s when you have children and they have their own children”. “ ohh so it’s kinda like when I have my children they’ll be your grand children, daddy”? “yes sweetie exactly” I remember the story he told me as he held me in his arms I never imagined getting older and not fitting on his lap. “On average, supernovae occur about once every 50 years in a galaxy the size of the Milky Way.They play a significant role in enriching the interstellar medium with higher mass elements. Furthermore, the expanding shock waves from supernova explosions can trigger the formation of new stars“. “Daddy what does SUPERNOVA MEAN”? “Nova (plural novae) means "new" in Latin, referring to what appears to be a very bright new star shining in the celestial sphere; the prefix "super-" distinguishes supernovae from ordinary novae, which also involve a star increasing in brightness, though to a lesser extent and through a different mechanism. A supernova is a stellar explosion. They are extremely luminous and cause a burst of radiation that often briefly outshines an entire galaxy, before fading from view over several weeks or months. During this short interval, a supernova can radiate as much energy as the Sun could emit over its life span. The explosion expels much or all of a star's material at a velocity of up to a tenth the speed of light, driving a shock wave into the surrounding interstellar medium. This shock wave sweeps up an expanding shell of gas and dust called a supernova remnant. Several kinds of supernovae exist that may be triggered in one of two ways, either turning off or suddenly turning on the production of energy through nuclear fusion. After the core of an aging massive star ceases to generate energy from nuclear fusion, it may undergo sudden gravitational collapse into a neutron star or black hole, releasing gravitational potential energy that heats and expels the star's outer layers“. I sat there with my hot dog in one hand and the other wiping off the excessive ketchup on my chin. I looked up into his eyes “daddy, when will I know understand what you said”? “my little darling one of these days a boy will tell you your as rare as a supernova and by that time you’ll know exactly what it is”. “daddy will I ever be as smart as you”. “only if get all that ketchup off your chin”. So as I sat there minutes only turned into hours and days rolled in new seasons, season’s became years and my little boy became my dad’s grand baby. And as sure as my daughter would become a supernova, a boy asked me to write about one……
