Two of the scientists of Aryabhatta Research Institute of Observational Sciences (ARIES) in Nainital have made vital contribution in discovering a gamma ray burst in the space. Addressing the media here on Wednesday, the institute director in-charge Wahab Uddin said that the gamma ray burst releases tremendous amounts of energy, up to 20 times more than the energy released by the sun. The institute’s senior scientists Shashibhushan Pandey and Kuntal Mishra were involved in the discovery of one such blast in space.
The research paper on this is also going to be published in the Nature Astronomy publication.
Uddin informed the media that the explosion in question had taken place on January 14 this year. This explosion was brief but very powerful and was named GRV 190114C. Scientists from about 20 nations were involved in this research work. He further said that this research work will help unravel the mysteries of giant stars in the universe. Along with ARIES, L Rashmi from Indian Institute of Space Science and Technology (IIST) Thiruvananthpuram, SB Chairukari and P Jaiswal were also involved in the research work.
Addressing the media, Pandey said that he used the help of Spain’s 10 metre GTC telescope for this discovery while Mishra studied it through the radio telescope in Pune. This gamma ray blast had taken place about 2.5 billion light years away from the earth in another galaxy. Following this discovery, scientists will be able to know about energy released by stars many times bigger than the sun in the future. Generally, such explosions take place in the outer galaxies.
If such a blast were to occur in our galaxy, it could have fatal effects. Mishra said that this cosmic occurrence had also helped scientists in measuring peak energy. In addition to telescopes on the earth, the telescopes set in space were also used in the research, she added.